LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



A TRUE TEACHER 



MARY MORTIMER 



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MINERVA BRACE NORTON 

Author of " In and Around Berlin," etc. 



^'MAY^ISqO 



FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY 

New York : : Chicago : : Toronto 



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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1894, by 

FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY, 

[n the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C 



DEDICATED 
TO 

Those who Have Been, Are, and Will Be 

inspired by This Example 

of 

Earnest, Truthful Teaching 

and 

Right Living. 



PREFACE. 



The closing decade of the nineteenth century has 
no more distinguishing characteristic than the en- 
larged opportunities which it offers to women. The 
education which enables women to enter upon these 
opportunities has been the preparatory work of the 
whole century. Its sources are in rills which ap- 
peared, mostly in New England, in the first quarter 
of the century, and which gathered volume in the 
second quarter, notably in the opening of Oberlin, 
a co-educational college, in 1833, and of Mt. Holy- 
oke Female Seminary in 1837. The third quarter 
witnessed greatly increased growth and momentum, 
by reason of the founding of Vassar and other 
colleges for women which approach the standard of 
the best colleges for men ; and the fourth quarter, 
not yet completed, has seen the remarkable enlarge- 
ment of this far-reaching movement. 

The great world-story of this new factor in history 
must be written in succeeding centuries. At pres- 
ent, its phenomena are attracting chief attention. 
The present is also the time when contributions to 
the study of the movement must be secured. Some 
of its early phases are of surpassing interest and im- 
portance, 

[vJ 



PREFACE. 



Such, it is believed, is the story told for the first 
time in this volume. The work of Mary Mortimer 
in Christian Education intertwined as it is with 
that of Catherine Beecher, has had no superior in 
the difficult and delicate work of awakening women 
to their duties and responsibilities without undue 
emphasis on their rights and privileges. It was 
work which found its appropriate field in the best 
intellect and the highest moral nature. It was 
never noisy nor self-asserting, but quiet, operative, 
intense, unique. 

The material for the chapter on the early history 
of the higher education of women has been gathered 
with painstaking from many sources which have 
been recognized and acknowledged as far as prac- 
ticable. 

That the volume may promote the true interests 
of woman and of humanity, and commend itself 
especially to the homes, the mothers, the daugh- 
ters, and the schools of the better day in whose 
dawn we already stand, is the motive which has led 
to its preparation. M. b. n. 



CONTENTS. 



PART I. 

THE PREPARATION. 
Chapter. Page. 

I. Childhood and Youth 3 

II. Education and Conversion 12 

III. Earl\ Teaching . , 27 

Summary 67 

PART II. 

THE LIFE WORK. 

I. The New West 73 

II. Catherine Beecher — Education 99 

III. Miss Mortimer and Miss Beecher 115 

IV. The Milwaukee School 124 

V. Rest and Change 171 

VI. Baraboo Female Seminary 188 

VII. Second Administration at Milwaukee College. 231 

VIII. Willow Glen — Last Days 281 

PART III. 

RETROSPECT. 

I. Miss Mortimer and her Work 295 

II. Tributes 315 



PART I. 



THE PREPARATION. 

Thou hast marked the slow rise of the tree — how its 

stem trembled first, 
Till it passed the kid's lips, the stag's antler ; then 

safely outburst 
The fan-branches all round ; and thou mindest when 

these, too, in turn, 
Broke abloom, and the palm-tree seemed perfect." 

— Browning's ' * Saul. " 



"To study the lives, to meditate on the sorrows, to 
commune with the thoughts of the great and holy men 
and women of this rich world, is a sacred discipline, 
which deserves at least to rank as the fore-court of the 
temple of true worship." — James Martineau. 



CHAPTER I. 

CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 

Amid the green fields and majestic trees of south- 
western England, surrounded by rich rolling mea- 
dows which are bounded by hedgerows, shaded by 
grand old oaks and spotted with grazing cattle, lies 
the town of Trowbridge in Wiltshire. Ten miles 
to the northwest is the city of Bath, with a history 
which spans the Christian era ; twenty miles to the 
southeast, across the plain of Stonehenge, the spire 
of Salisbury Cathedral pierces the sky. About as 
far to the southwest, the finest group of ecclesias- 
tical buildings in England clusters about the wells 
of living water which have given their name to ca- 
thedral, city, and bishopric, and the Abbey of Glas- 
tonbury, the earliest seat of English history and 
Christianity, lifts its ruined and ivy-mantled walls 
above the traditional burial-place of Joseph of 
Arimathea and of King Arthur. 

Trowbridge is to-day a woolen manufacturing, 
railroad town of twenty thousand inhabitants, with 
the villas of prosperous tradesmen adorning its 
suburbs. Seventy-five years ago it was an ancient 
village where clear west country heads and stout 
English hearts wrought with vital strength and 

[3] 



MARY MORTIMER. 



power, in patience, after the manner of the 

fathers. There the established church of St. 

James reared its venerable walls, within which the 
poet Crabbe, 

"Though nature's sternest painter, yet the best/' 

officiated as rector, and there, too, the great renais- 
sance of religious life had made its home in a stone 
chapel for the worship of the people called Method- 
ists. 

It was the England which had felt in great earth- 
quake shocks the throes of the French Revolution, 
and over which had surged a refluent wave of con- 
servatism ; which had marveled at the sudden 
splendors of the First Empire across the Channel, 
and shuddered at Marengo and Austerlitz and 
Leipsic and blazing Moscow ; which had buckled 
on its armor and gone forth with Nelson at Trafal- 
gar, with Wellington to the Peninsula. It was the 
England in which women sat by lonely hearths and 
wept for husbands, sons, and brothers who fell last 
year on the field of Waterloo, the England which 
scarcely yet breathed freely in the knowledge that 
he who had overwhelmed Europe in blood was safe 
on his rock at St. Helena. Great debt hung heavy 
upon the neck of Britain, and from Land's End to 
John O'Groat's there was severe agricultural distress, 
to be followed soon by corresponding depression in 
trade and manufactures. 

De Quincy has well said : — 



THE PREPARATION. 



"The agitation, the frenzy, the sorrow of the times 
reacted upon the human intellect, and forced men into 
meditation. Their own nature was held up before them 
in a sterner form. They were compelled to contemplate 
an ideal of man far more colossal than is brought for- 
ward in the tranquil aspects of society : and they were 
often engaged, whether they would or not, with the 
elementary problems of social philosophy. Mere dan- 
ger forced a man into thoughts which else were foreign 
to his habits. Mere necessity of action forced him to 
decide." 

It was in England at such a time that Mary Mor- 
timer was born, at Trowbridge, Dec. 2, 1816. 
Her parents, William Mortimer and Mary (Pierce), 
his wife, with a name reaching back to the time of 
the Plantagenets, were plain and simple folk, and 
bequeathed to their children, along with their name, 
a most honest and honorable character. Loyal 
English souls they were, too,- judging from the his- 
toric baptismal name, Edmund, bestowed on the 
eldest son, while the eldest daughter bore that 
of the Princess Charlotte, whose untimely death 
plunged all England into heart-felt grief before 
these Mortimers had left their native land. 

Mary was the sixth child and fourth daughter in 
a family of seven children. Before she had com- 
pleted her fifth year, the family emigrated to 
America. The Trowbridge home, on the site of 
the ancient castle-hill at the head of Court street, 
surrounded by trees of the father's planting, was 



MARY MORTIMER. 



not, however, sold ; and when the family arrived 
at Bristol, that port whence so many English emi- 
grants had ventured forth to the New World, the 
eldest son, a boy of sixteen, refused to go. The 
family remained at Bristol for a week, when the 
father, wisely yielding to the manly desire of the 
son to remain and make his own way in the land 
of his birth, returned to Trowbridge with him and 
arranged home and business for the youth. Then, 
though the mother's heart lingered pathetically 
with her boy, the family sailed for New York. 

It was long before the days of railways and 
ocean-steamers, and the voyage, in a sailing-vessel, 
was one of weeks which lengthened into months. 
What impression the sublimity of the sea made 
upon the young child's susceptible nature we do 
not know, for her memory did not retain it. It 
was one of her keen regrets that in twice crossing 
the ocean in mature life, the "malady of the sea" 
kept her from enjoying the sight of its billows and 
its storms. 

The land of her birth was but a dim memory to 
Mary until she revisited it half a century afterward. 
On her journey from Liverpool to London, in 1871, 
she wrote : ' ' Four thousand miles from home and 
from you, I bethink myself this is my native land, 
the home of my father and mother of blessed mem- 
ory to their children. A dim, vague memory of 
learning the large letters in the large old Bible I 
have in Milwaukee, under the guidance of my 



THE PKEPARA TION. 



mother's hand, seems to rise from the past, — the 
far past, when King George Fourth, of not blessed 
memory reigned over these islands. As I muse, 
seeing the beautiful and cultivated landscape before 
me, and remembering the hardships of my mother's 
life in America, my heart aches for her." 

The family lived at first in the city of New York, 
where the seventh and youngest child, John, was 
born. They afterward removed to the central part 
of the State, much of which was then almost a 
wilderness. In Cayuga County they took up their 
abode, and finally settled on a farm, near the 
village of Waterloo, and not far from Geneva. 
Amid this beautiful lake-region of central New 
York, Mary's intense love of nature was nourished 
by congenial influences, and perhaps she first here 
became conscious of that English preference for 
country over city life which she often emphatically 
expressed in later years. ■ 

1 ' Her childhood was marked by many peculiarities 
that no one seemed fully to understand," writes a 
relative, ' ' and she was not a popular or pleasing 
child. She seldom joined in the plays of other 
children, but sought, in such books as she could 
find, her chief recreation. A wonderful depth of 
heart and mind was concealed by a modest and 
diffident exterior to an extent often most painful to 
herself and perplexing to her friends." 

After a few years the eldest son and brother 
joined his parents in America, bringing with him a 



MA R Y MOR TIMER. 



young English wife. Not long after the son's ar- 
rival, in the summer of 1829, both the parents were 
stricken down with one of the fevers incident to a 
new country, and within the brief space of a single 
week, death removed, first the mother, and then 
the father of the young family. 

Mary, a mature child of twelve years, seemed to 
realize fully the awful nature of this stroke. To 
the thoughtful brain, God had joined a passion- 
ately affectionate nature which was now over- 
whelmed in hopeless sorrow. Her chief earthly 
ties had been sundered by a swift and sudden blow. 
She stood orphaned in the world, her heart crushed, 
blindly, instinctively groping for help she knew not 
how to find. Friends who heard her refer, in 
later years, to this bereavement, — not with many 
words but always with the deepest feeling, — can 
never forget the impression of its bitter agony. 

The tendrils of her loving nature, thus rudely 
torn from their natural support, twined themselves 
round her older sister, Sibyl, whom, to the end of 
life, she regarded with the utmost devotion, and 
who possessed a character worthy of such rare 
affection. Her brother, John, five years younger 
than herself, also shared regally in the wealth 
of her affectionate heart. Possessing uncommon 
strength of regard for all her near kindred, she yet 
bestowed her utmost love upon this sister and 
brother. In her strong womanhood, after family 
ties had bound them to their own for many years, 



THE PREPARATION. 



and her life had been filled with cares and trials in 
a widely diverging path, she was crushed to the 
earth by their death, and out of these great sorrows 
she rose up to lay garlands of touching remem- 
brance and imperishable affection upon the grave 
of each. 

The calamity which had deprived the family of 
both parents left the eldest son and brother, 
Edmund, chief counsellor among the children, and 
guardian of their slender patrimony. Mary's share 
she wished to transmute into material for feeding 
her unbounded craving for knowledge, but her 
guardian, with true English thrift, refused his per- 
mission. She, however, attended the common 
schools, and for a short time the Academy at 
Auburn, N. Y. , where her eldest brother, after a 
time, took up his residence, and in whose family 
she found a home. At the age of sixteen she began 
to teach a country school, but the same qualities 
which had marked her childhood interfered with 
her apparent success, and her deep, original nature 
not easily falling into the educational traditions of 
the time, she relinquished the work. Not far from 
this time Mary and her sister, Sibyl, found for some 
months a most congenial abode in a Quaker family 
in Scipio, N. Y. As the better educational advan- 
tages for which she deeply longed were denied her, 
she devoted all the time she could win from other 
duties to private study. She has been heard to 
refer to her home study of geometry in these years, 



10 MARY MORTIMER. 

with the book propped open behind the coffee-mill, 
at which she would glance occasionally as she went 
to and fro in household duties, reciting to herself 
every morning the demonstrations from the begin- 
ning as far as she had learned. The home in which 
she found herself at Scipio was presided over by a 
sweet Quaker matron who in quietness of spirit 
brought about great results with small outlay. The 
favorite motto from Goethe of Mary's mature life, 
4 'Without haste, without rest," found brightest 
illustration in this cherished friend of her youth, 
and hundreds of Miss Mortimer's pupils learned 
lessons of value from references to "Aunt Susy" 
long after the serene Quaker face was under 
the sod. 

The marriage of her sister Sibyl, who became the 
wife of Mr. L. S. Bannister, was a great trial to 
the youthful Mary, second only to the terrible 
stroke which had deprived her of her parents. 
Her intense affection could brook no rival in the 
regard of the idolized sister, but was, perhaps, not 
so much the morbid passion that it may have 
seemed to those who could not understand the 
strangely intense young girl, as the exponent of a 
great nature, with wonderful powers of thought 
and emotion, and which was all the more tem- 
pestuous, because its fastidious shrinking found few 
friends fitted to call it forth — perhaps none per- 
fectly so. 



THE PREPARATION. \\ 

During all these years of unguided study and 
struggle she was wandering amid the desolations of 
religious unbelief. At times speaking of the great 
problems of life and destiny to her brothers and 
sisters, some of whom shared the same skeptical 
tendencies, more often pondering these things si- 
lently in her heart, she was deeply unhappy. 

Thus sorely in need of help, of sympathy and 
guidance, she reached the age when she could 
legally take possession of her share of the paternal 
estate, and turned with the elasticity of the bent 
bow toward her long-desired object, the attainment 
of a better education. In the year 1837 sne en- 
tered the seminary for young ladies under the care 
of Mrs. Ricord in Geneva, N. Y., with no very 
definite aim beyond the longing to gratify her in- 
satiable craving for knowledge. 



CHAPTER II. 

EDUCATION AND CONVERSION. 

At the time when Miss Mortimer entered the 
Geneva Seminary, the principal was temporarily 
absent, and the school was under the charge of 
Miss Clarissa Thurston, associate principal. Miss 
Mary A. Bradley, a young lady near Miss Mortimer's 
own age, was also a teacher there. The friend- 
ships she at once formed with these teachers were 
most influential to the end of life. After an un- 
broken intimacy with Miss Mortimer for forty years, 
Miss Thurston wrote : ' ' The years at Geneva were, 
in many respects, the most important and decisive 
of her life," and a family friend writes, " It was at 
Geneva that she first began really to live." 

It has been said that at Geneva Seminary Miss 
Mortimer went through a four years' course of study 
in two years. Miss Thurston says : "In two years 
she did acquire a thorough knowledge of the prin- 
cipal branches in the course, and besides studying, 
in the second year she taught several classes. 
Often she sat up until after midnight and rose 
before day to pursue her studies. She entered at 
the middle of a term and took up Chemistry, and 
Mental Science, Latin, and I think, Paley's Natural 

[12] 



THE PREPARATION. 13 



Theology. She recited alone in Latin and made 
rapid strides. In the other studies she was soon 
altogether in advance of those who had been pur- 
suing them during the whole term. The next term 
she took up Algebra, Evidences of Christianity, 
Ancient History, Astronomy, and continued her 
Latin. Later she studied Rhetoric, Moral Philoso- 
phy, a History of Modern Europe in three volumes, 
Geometry, Butler's Analogy, and some time, I 
hardly know when, she acquired considerable knowl- 
edge of French. We gave no diploma to a gradu- 
ating pupil, but a certificate stating the branches 
she had studied. History, Mathematics, and 
Metaphysics were absorbing studies to her. " These 
three lines of study continued to be Miss Morti- 
mer's pre-eminent choices through life, and her 
remarkable attainments in the first, and wonderful 
analytic and constructive powers in the last, 
marked most truly the scope and grasp of her 
mind. 

The friendships formed at Geneva with her 
teachers, and the large liberty for heart and mind 
afforded by the atmosphere of this Christian school 
were of the greatest service to the unformed but 
rapidly unfolding character of this remarkable pupil, 
and made of Geneva a heart-home which had never 
before been found by the orphaned girl. As leafy 
verdure in a backward spring-time shrinks within 
the cover of the buds from the cold winds, giving 
no sign of life until the warm breezes blow, and 



14 MARY MORTIMER. 

then bursts forth almost to maturity in a day, all 
the more vigorously because held back so long, so 
this shrinking soul soon clothed itself in the gar- 
ments of praise when congenial sympathies and in- 
fluences were at work about it. 

At the time of her going to Geneva, Miss Morti- 
mer's burning thirst for knowledge was second only 
to her intense spiritual struggles, She had by 
nature a strong tendency to question any system 
which challenged her belief until she had followed, 
link by link, its entire chain of evidence, pausing at 
each until a full measure of light shone upon it. 
She was known among her schoolmates as an 
infidel and condemned by certain ones, who fancied 
themselves superior in faith, because she did not 
believe in Christianity. This she once said in after 
years, ' ' was unspeakably cruel. I longed in agony 
to believe, and I could not." But under the quick 
sympathy and the clear teachings of her instructors 
she gradually came to the light. 

Miss Thurston writes of this period : — 

"One sultry morning, July 14, 1837, among the 
group of young ladies assembled for the opening exer- 
cises of the school, I observed a stranger-pupil, her 
countenance attractive from its being lighted up with 
intelligence, and indicating a maturity of mind that 
quite distinguished her from others of the youthful 
audience. 

"When I conferred with her as to the studies she 
wished to pursue, I found she had made good progress 



THE PREPARATION. 15 



and was desirous of taking up branches in the higher 
department. She was quite sure that she could attend 
to more studies than seemed to me possible, the classes 
being so far advanced at that time in the term. She 
was plain in her appearance and taciturn in her manners, 
but her speaking face and her readiness in recitation 
soon rendered her conspicuous among her classmates. 
Her teachers were much impressed with her superior 
mental endowments, and with her faithful attention to 
every school duty 

" Much interest being thus awakened in regard to our 
new pupil, we were led to seek the secret springs that 
gave direction to her course of action. We found much 
that was pleasing, — an intense desire for knowledge, a 
fine literary taste, a delight in delving into foundation 
principles, a mind not satisfied to take upon trust the 
conclusions of others, but intent upon arriving at the 
truth by pursuing a train of reasoning for itself. 

"The change in her character wrought at Geneva was 
remarkable. In the pride of her intellect she had built 
for herself a fine structure of morality upon which she 
purposed to model her character without the aid of 
Divine power or the teaching of Revelation. In this 
state of mind she entered the class in Moral Philosophy, 
and that in Evidences of Christianity. She became 
convinced of the truth that the Bible is a revelation 
from God, and that a religion not based upon this can- 
not save the soul. . . . The Gospel plan of Salvation 
was unfolded to her. She accepted it, not without great 
struggles, but at last, in true humility of spirit, became 
a believer in Jesus. . . . With all the ardor of her 
nature and the power of her intellect, she entered into 



16 MARY MORTIMER. 

the service of her Master, never resting, until bidden to 
come up higher and enter into the joy of her Lord." 

The anniversary of the Sabbath day, Dec. 31, 
1837, which was to her the climax of decisive 
change, was ever after a time of abiding memories 
and deepest gratitude. To the friend who stood 
nearest her at this crucial hour, she wrote, eleven 
years afterward : — 

" Years ago there was a Sabbath, like this the last 
day of the year. On the morning of that day, which 
was made bright and beautiful by the sunlight of heaven, 
walked a lone child of earth to an earthly temple. 
Lonely she was in spirit; none sympathized in or knew 
the feelings which worked at her heart, which fevered 
her brow, — lonely most of all had she been in the con- 
viction which for long weary years had pressed upon 
her that for her there dwelt no Friend above, whose 
existence, Eternity, and whose nature, Love, could sat- 
isfy the deepest, loftiest yearnings of her nature. She 
had been proud and self-willed, and had looked to her 
own understanding for guidance until ' darkness which 
might be felt' had settled upon her ; her best, dearest, 
earthly friends lay silent beneath the clods of the valley. 
No wonder that earth to her had become a dreary waste, 
that she was desolate, oh ! how desolate. Glad faces 
and beating hearts were all about her, the earth in its 
varied beauty was spread out around her, and the glori- 
ous canopy of heaven was over her. She saw it, felt it 
all, but only the more fully to realize her desolation. 
. . . She could not reach the glorious Creator of whom 



THE PREPARATION. Yl 



nature in her speaking beauty, whispered. She could 
only cry, ' O Thou Lofty One that inhabitest eternity, 
wilt Thou not hear a worm of earth and reveal Thyself 
to her?* But pride and self were still unconquered, 
and the darkness only grew darker. . . . With no Bible, 
for it was but 'foolishness and a stumbling-block ' to 
her, with no God, no Saviour, she had stoically resolved 
to nerve herself for the conflict of life, to gather any 
flowers she might find in the dreary way, and to be con- 
tent until the grim monster, Death, to her vision an 
Angel of Light, should come to her relief. 

" But that sunlit Sabbath a new light was shining upon 
her, 'a light which the darkness comprehended not/ 
and such a tumult was excited within her that she 
scarcely realized her bodily existence. 

"The Only-Wise had left her to the chosen guidance 
of her own wisdom until she was convinced by bitter 
and undeniable experience that it was but an ignis 
fatuus, which had only bewildered and dazzled her, 
. . . that virtue, even, a dim abstraction which she 
had idolized, she could not attain. Thus was she 
humbled and fitted to appreciate the force of the evi- 
dence which, faithfully and earnestly, had at length 
been set before her, to prove that He who made all 
things had revealed Himself to the children of men, 
that He would hear their cry and give to them bread 
from heaven and water from the river of life, — and in 
a gush of intense overpowering emotion, she was pon- 
dering the question now pressing upon her, < Can it be 
that the book I have so despised and derided is the 
word of the Holy One ? that He has condescended to 
speak and offer Himself to be a Friend to such an one 



18 MARY MORTIMER. 

as I, and I have stopped my ears and blinded my eyes 
to the blessed truth ? 

" She dared not believe that He had done all this; 
she trembled at the thought that she had made such a 
return. What a history is the human heart ! Who 
can portray it ? That lone wanderer from her Father's 
house, in amazement and consternation, mentally stood 
still. It seemed as if some miracle would be wrought 
before her to settle the startling question. She uncon- 
sciously looked to see ' a strong wind rend the mount- 
ain or an earthquake shake the earth, or a fire break 
out before her,' but all was calm and unmoved. Her 
heart alone, as she went to that earthly temple, beat so 
tumultuously that she scarcely heard the preacher's 
voice. She was unconscious of the 'still small voice' 
that was whispering to her, and that God was in the 
voice. The service closed. Mechanically she walked 
with the multitude toward her abode, when lo ! thou 
didst appear before her, thou who wast the?i her friend, 
thou who hadst gently, kindly, but earnestly and faith- 
fully plead with her for the truth of God ; thou who 
hadst almost convinced her that there was 'balm in 
Gilead and a physician there ' to heal all maladies, that 
she need no longer wander lone and desolate on earth. 
... In silence ye walked together until in low and 
earnest tones thou didst inquire, 'M., have you yet re- 
solved to be a Christian ? ' Little didst thou know how 
that question thrilled through every nerve of her to 
whom it was addressed. 

" ' No,' she said to herself, ' I have not, but if I give 
this answer, I shall be asked, why ? What can I, shall 
I say ? This friend, kind and true as she is, knows not 



THE PREPARATION-. 19 



my difficulties ; she cannot appreciate them ; I cannot 
utter them.' The obligation to be a Christian if she 
might be one, she had long seen and felt, it pressed as 
the weight of a world upon her now, — but then, per- 
haps \t ^2,% not true, — and there arose before her the 
objections which for long years had been gathering 
strength within her, and darkness was again settling over 
her, when athwart that view, clear as if the light of 
Heaven shone upon it, came the arguments which so 
faithfully thou hadst set forth for the truth of Jesus, and 
she felt < None can refute them, ' ' the Bible must be true. ' 
Still a lingering doubt remained, a doubt which boded 
ruin. < It may not be, and then, if I should make this 
resolution, I could not keep it, and it is folly and wick- 
edness to make and break vows.' Such was the spe- 
cious plea which well-nigh overcame her, but in that hour 
of fearful conflict between darkness and light, between 
the flesh and the spirit, the Good One sent his angel to 
whisper, * If thou resolvest to do what thy clearest con- 
victions show to be thy highest duty, thou canst incur 
no guilt from this, . . . fear not.' And that heart 
quivering on the line which separates light from dark- 
ness, life from death, with one earnest prayer to an 
' unknown God ' for strength, with the energy of despair 
and hope combined, threw itself toward the point 
whence it believed light would come, ... as its 
possessor turned to thee, still silent by her side, and 
answered, ' / have resolved. ' 

"On this, the anniversary of that day so dark, yet so 
fraught with blessings, that twilight of her existence, 
she turns to thee with unutterable emotions. . . . She 
yearns to express to thee the deepest gratitude of her 



20 MARY MORTIMER. 

heart for thy faithful labors to lead her to the light and 
truth. She would tell thee, if words could utter it, how- 
bright at length has arisen upon her the sun of which 
thou dost so beautifully reflect the rays ; how darkness 
has become light and the crooked places straight before 
her. She would describe how precious has become the 
Being whom then she knew not, how like hues of living 
light His word appears. At the foot of the cross the 
problem of life has been solved, truth has been found, 
the spirit healed of its maladies, and a glorious immor- 
tality opened to the ravished vision of the once deso- 
late wanderer. Thou who didst guide her to that cross 
wilt pardon the gush of emotion which impels her once 
more to obtrude herself upon thee, and the incident of 
which this day is commemorative, and which is stamped 
in burning characters on her memory. . . . May He 
who in mercy sent thee to her in her hour of need, 
shed upon thee the richest blessings, may He lead thee 
into the green pastures and beside the still waters of his 
love, may 'His candle' ever enlighten thy dwelling. 
May He send his angels to strew flowers of beauty, of 
peace, and love in thy pathway on earth, and at last 
open to thee the portals of everlasting blessedness." 

A few days after the date of the foregoing letter 
she wrote to Miss Thurston of this anniversary. 



"Jan. 6, 1849. 
"This year, — you did not think of it, perhaps, — the 
last day of December was on Sabbath, as it was eleven 
years ago, and the more vividly was that important 
epoch of my life brought to mind. . . . You can im- 
agine, you who know so well what I was, what were my 



THE PREPARATION. 21 

feelings, what they now are. God be praised ! I re- 
mind you, for deeply associated as you are in all these 
events, I want you to rejoice with me, and M. A. too. 
I wonder if this last sunlit Sabbath, so like the one 
when we walked together and she led me to the most 
blessed resolution of my life, reminded her of her 
friend." 

Under the date of March 30, 1842, her sister, 
Mrs. Sibyl Bannister, wrote to Miss Thurston : — 

". . . I have ever looked upon the circumstances of 
our being brought together as graciously providential, 
and designed for my benefit and that of my sister. 
When I think of dear sister Mary and her unhappy con- 
dition a few years since, without father or mother, and 
without friends except her orphan brothers and sisters, 
and destitute of that light which alone can guide us in 
the path of life, . . . truly when I think of these 
things, I am led to praise and adore the Hand that 
made you and your dear fellow-teacher the instruments 
of bringing her to a knowledge of the truth. . . . This 
one instance is enough to strengthen our faith in the 
promises of God." 

Miss Thurston's reminiscences of those days are 
interesting, and show the workings of Miss Morti- 
mer's mind on the great problems of life and des- 
tiny. 

"The Bible now became her study," writes Miss 
T. , " and much did she lament her ignorance of its 
sacred truths. With a spirit of meekness she sought 
my instruction, and the year that followed was one 



22 MARY MORTIMER. 

of interest to us both. I left her to search the word 
of God according to her own sense of need and the 
interest she felt in its pages, giving what time I 
could to conversation with her on the subjects 
therein revealed. But as she was a day-pupil, it 
was but little intercourse that we could have with- 
out neglecting other duties. I therefore proposed 
that we should talk with the pen. . . . This cor- 
respondence I have preserved, at least I have her 
replies to my letters." The first quoted bears 

date — 

"July 3, 1838. 
"It is with heartfelt pleasure and gratitude that I 
gratify your desire of knowing my feelings, my per- 
plexities, my doubts. It would be vain should I at- 
tempt to tell you the intensity of my feelings when I 
first saw that I had spent my life in the dark path of 
error, when I was first convinced that the high and 
holy Being who rules the universe had condescended 
to give us a revelation of his will, that a Saviour had 
died for our transgressions, and I had disregarded all. 
Mind and body seemed to sink under the overwhelming 
thought, and the months that followed were passed in a 
state of continual excitement. May I, my dear teacher, 
offer this as some palliation for my neglect of doctrines, 
my neglect of all, save to me the thrilling fact that 
Christianity is true. . . . Perhaps I permit feeling to 
influence me too much, but I do most earnestly desire 
to be led into the way of truth." 

Here follows her statement of dissent from some 
of the doctrines accepted by her teachers, and her 



THE PREPARATION. 23 

serious questioning of others, made, not without 
humility, but in clear reliance on her own reasoning 
powers. Of another doctrine she says : "It is a 
mystery I have not yet fathomed ; I have no settled 
opinion on this subject." "The Bible is to me a 
new book, and though most of its contents is yet 
shrouded in darkness, I do rejoice that this treasure 
is in my hands, and hope that its blessed light will 
save me from future error." 

Her teacher wisely forbore to combat the posi- 
tions of her dissenting pupil, and says, ' ' I felt sure 
that by searching the Scriptures she would soon 
come to the light." She was at first disappointed 
that the errors to which she still clung were not no- 
ticed, but afterward writes : i ' Reflection has taught 
me you were right, and I now rejoice that you did 
not put another temptation in my way by attempting 
to reason with me. . . . I have been trying to read 
the Bible under your direction and have proved 
your words true, ' The more 'you study it, the more 
precious it will become to you.' . . . A year has 
rolled round since a kind Providence directed me to 
you, and many overpowering reflections are brought 
to my mind. I came here an isolated being, feeling 
that science was the only light that glimmered 
across the universal gloom. Now — but you can 
realize better than I can tell, the change that has 
come over me." 

" In accordance with my advice," continues Miss 
Thurston, ' ' she decided to remain in school another 



24 MARY MORTIMER. 

year, and to adopt teaching as her life-work. . . . 
Her great desire now was to dedicate her time and 
talents to that employment in which she could be 
most useful." 

This second year, as a pupil in Geneva Seminary, 
was, like the first, a time of investigation. The 
great decision of her life was irrevocably made. 
She was henceforth a Christian believer. But she 
"saw men as trees walking;" the transformation 
from darkness to light had not as yet shown her the 
true perspective of important phases of Christian 
doctrine. Her original nature led her to search out 
these for herself, though she often appealed for 
sympathy and help to the instructor whose influence 
had been so blessed to her. For some time she 
held to the Quaker view of the ordinances of bap- 
tism and the Lord's supper as not needed in a 
spiritual religion, and she was doubtful of all de- 
nominational distinctions and tenets. In Novem- 
ber, 1838, she writes, "There is a want of clearness 
in my conception of the doctrines of the different 
denominations ; I must understand the Bible far 
better than I do now before I can decide between 
them." This disquietude was the more deeply felt 
because in her own family circle there were Quakers, 
Methodists, and Universalists, while her beloved 
teachers were members of the Presbyterian Church. 
This last was the church now nearest to her, and 
after months of testing its leading doctrines by the 
Bible, she went before the session of the Presby- 



THE PREPARA TION 



terian Church of Geneva, presented in writing an 
account of her religious experience and views of 
doctrinal truth, and a few weeks after was admitted 
to its communion, in February, 1839. 

1 ' The Christian graces shone brightly in her 
character," writes her teacher. " Her charity was 
abounding, reaching down to raise from the depths 
those whom the world despises, — a soul emptied of 
self, ever longing to impart blessings to others. 
The longer she lived, the more her views were ex- 
panded, and her heart was moved for the lost and 
perishing in every land." 

One of Miss Mortimer's teachers at Geneva, Miss 
(now Mrs.) M. A. Bradley, writes of the years spent 
there : — 

"How well I remember her as a pupil, docile, faith- 
ful, earnest, never shirking any responsibility and never 
doing any superficial work, patient, persistent, holding 
herself rigidly to the achievement of all that was pos- 
sible in whatever she undertook. Retiring in manner 
and utterly unconscious of superiority, by her eagerness 
for knowledge and the force of her intellect, she was 
conspicuous, even when shrinking from observation. 
She 'gave heed to instruction/ and her presence in class 
was always an inspiration to her teachers. Simplicity 
and integrity of character were strongly marked traits. 
Incapable of dissimulation, she could not conceal from 
her teachers the burden of doubt she had carried for 
years as to the truth of Divine Revelation. She felt 
that her mental difficulties could not be understood by 



26 MARY MORTIMER. 

those who had never known them, and her struggle was 
severe. She wanted to know the truth, and seeking for 
it in the way of argument and external evidence, she 
reached an intellectual conviction which only increased 
her wretchedness. There was no rest or peace for her 
till she tried the test of experiment. /If any man will 
do His will, he shall know of the doctrine. ' 'This is 
the will of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath 
sent.' She made a full self-surrender, and then what 
light and joy broke in upon her ! Henceforth her life 
was a steady purpose and effort to do His will." 

At the age of twenty-one Miss Mortimer seemed 
to have lived a long life of struggle with doubt and 
uncertainty. Now with undisciplined strength of 
intellect, emotion, and will, she had given herself in 
life-long surrender to the best she knew, and found 
that birthright which she had sought so long and 
carefully and with so many tears. 



CHAPTER III. 

EARLY TEACHING GENEVA, BROCKPORT, LE ROY. 

' ' A teacher, above almost any other, needs to 
serve a faithful apprenticeship to her business ; and 
I look back and rejoice in deep gratitude that I 
have been led, it may be at pecuniary sacrifice, to 
serve a ten years' apprenticeship under tutors and 
guardians." Thus wrote Miss Mortimer as she 
stood in her early prime on the threshold of a great 
change. This " ten years' apprenticeship, " as she 
was pleased to call it, was spent in three places, 
and considerably broken at intervals by ill health ; 
it ran through all grades, from her beginning in 
1838 as assistant pupil in Geneva to the assured 
strength of almost independent work at Le. Roy 
Female Seminary, in the absence of its Principal in 
Europe, in 1 847. But until the latter part of this 
period at Le Roy, she was seldom without the pres- 
ence and sympathy of teachers and friends whose 
greater experience or whose special gifts exercised 
over her a marked influence without destroying the 
strong individuality which underlay her diffident 
and somewhat reticent manner. Her disposition 
to independent thought and originality of method 
was remarkably combined with humility and eager- 

[27] 



28 MARY MORTIMER. 

ness to attain the best, producing the docility 
which her discriminating teacher, Miss Bradley, 
has named first among her characteristics. 

The three most intimate friends of this period 
were all teachers, Miss Thurston, her senior ; Miss 
M. A. Bradley, her contemporary ; and Miss Frances 
Collier, her junior in years. The experience, devo- 
tion, and practical wisdom of the first, the elevation, 
gentleness, and benignity of the second, and the deli- 
cacy, vivacity and fine artistic nature of the third, 
each appealed to her susceptibilities, met her needs, 
and called forth the warm admiration and affection 
of her heart. In addition to the influence of these 
three life-long friends, Miss Mortimer was constantly 
brought into contact with other teachers in whom 
her quiet but keen observation could discern special 
excellencies of adaptation, methods or results ; at 
Geneva and Le Roy she was working on founda- 
tions laid by others, some of whom were among the 
foremost teachers of their time and region. This 
experience was to her far more beneficial than an 
extended course in technical pedagogics ; for it was 
unformulated but vital theory combined with con- 
stant and severely self-scrutinized practice. Her 
passionate love for the work, her lofty ideals, un- 
fettered by conventionalities, and her patient and 
persistent efforts to overcome all obstacles in herself 
and her pupils, were nowhere without marked effect. 

At Geneva Seminary, after she had completed 
her studies in 1839, she remained two years as a 



THE PREPARATION. 29 

teacher ; her four years there having a strongly 
marked unity of influence both as received from 
teachers, and communicated, not at second hand, 
but as a part of vital growth, to her pupils. Her 
correspondence during the later, as in the earlier 
years at Geneva, was addressed mainly to her 
family friends when in school, and to the teachers 
during vacations, and in other absences through ill 
health which had begun to shadow her pathway. 
Her favorite theme is Christianity ; her constantly 
growing happiness in its contemplation and prac- 
tice being diminished only when the unbelief of 
some of her nearest and dearest kindred saddens 
her heart. When Presbyterian doctrines were at- 
tacked, she at first began to write out her belief, 
which conformed in the main to the standards of 
the church of her choice. But on second thought 
she desisted, in adherence to her early rule "to 
defend Christianity, not Prcsbytcrianism" In all 
the ardor of her youth and her early Christian ex- 
perience, it was not possible for her to be a bigot. 

The time now approaches when the friendship of 
Miss Thurston on which Miss Mortimer had so 
much leaned in her emergence from the darkness of 
her youth, was to be, gradually and gently, but 
firmly disengaged, as a prop, while it continued 
through life as a present and remembered blessing. 

In regard to the circumstances attending Miss 
Mortimer's leaving Geneva and her subsequent life 
in Brockport, Miss Thurston wrote : — 



30 MARY MORTIMER. 



" Miss Mortimer's four years in Geneva of such in- 
tense application, both as pupil and teacher, had been 
more than she had strength to endure. Her last year 
there was one of great suffering, and she ought to have 
taken a year for recuperation. But I had received an 
application for a teacher to fill the position of Principal 
of the Female Department of Brockport (N. Y.) Colle- 
giate Institute. Knowing her to be admirably fitted for 
the position, I could not but desire her to take it, and 
she was equally desirous of entering this new field of 
labor. . . . The great, and I may say, the only hin- 
drance to her enjoyment at Brockport was intense 
bodily suffering. Her system seemed full of disease, 
and her right hand and right foot became nearly help- 
less. Before the close of the first year, I was also en- 
gaged in the same institution, and Miss Collier entered 
at the same time as music teacher. By our relieving 
her from all care, and doing all that could be done to 
alleviate her sufferings, she was able most of the time 
to instruct her classes, but she took no general over- 
sight of the school while I was with her." 

Thus the hope with which Miss Mortimer entered 
upon this new field was speedily dissipated by in- 
creasing physical disability. But her feelings at the 
thought of entering upon work for which she at first 
expected to be alone responsible, are mirrored in a 
letter to Miss. T. The chirography of her letters, 
always unique and full of character, shows at this 
period, by the greater firmness and consistency of 
its strokes, that she who wielded the pen was al- 
ready entering on that maturity of thought and 



THE PREPARATION. 31 

freedom of action which marked her womanhood. 
But the first stepping out from the shelter of her 
loved Geneva friends was shadowed by lowly self- 
estimate and self-distrust. 

"Nov. 20, 1841. 

"The hour draws near, when, without the guidance 
and support of my loved friend, I am, among strangers, 
to assume new and untried responsibilities, and in view 
of it an oppressive sadness creeps over me. There is, 
however, mingled with that sadness, some trust in Him 
who has said, ( Sufficient to thy day shall thy strength 
be.' 

"Over the future there hang two clouds; the one, 
your absence, the other, the charge I have accepted. 
The first I must endeavor to dispel by getting nearer 
to the light which emanates from the countenance of a 
higher Friend. . . . The other, too, I know will vanish 
if I undoubtingly, trustingly, lean upon this Friend. I 
wish you, my dear sister, to write me very explicit direc- 
tions and counsel to help me in all emergencies. Tell 
me particularly as to religious instruction what course I 
shall take." 

The first letter after reaching the new field is 
dated — 

"Brockport, Dec. 7, 1841. 

[After describing the unfinished condition of the 
large and fine new edifice erected for the school, and 
the consequent difficulties in beginning.] "We already 
number ninety, by next Monday probably shall have 
more than a hundred students. Much the larger num- 
ber are gentlemen. The ladies do not seem very much 



32 MARY MORTIMER. 

advanced, tho' some of them appear very well. The 
college building is a little out of the village, standing in 
solitary grandeur. . . . Do you begin to feel badly 
about my prospects ? Spare yourself, except on the 
ground that I very much fear that I shall disgrace you 
and your recommendations. All this confusion has at 
least spared me the excitement I should have felt if I 
had had a formal beginning. But there is a drawback 
even worse than excitement. My pupils will be getting 
bad habits (in regard to study, surrounded by the con- 
fusion of completing the building). . . . The prospect 
for pupils is, however, good." 

"Sabbath Evening, Jan. 2, 1842. 

"I feel my obligations to a considerable extent, and 
have felt, I think I may say, an abiding and increasing 
earnestness in supplication at a mercy seat for grace 
and wisdom to fit me for the duties of my station and 
for a blessing on my labor. . . . O that the Father of 
mercies may hear our prayers and answer them to the 
best good of these dear young people. 

"I much feel the need of Christian intercourse and 
counsel. . . . My advances I fancy are met rather 
coldly, and I shrink away with the fear that I may be 
thought affectedly zealous. Perhaps I may be wrong, 
and in meekness I will try again to lead to the topics 
which should be nearest our hearts. I suspect I am 
too square and decided, which you know is my besetting 
sin. I will try to watch myself on this point. . . . 

" Most affectionately, 

"Your own child in the faith, 

"Mary." 



THE PREPARATION. 33 

As ill health increased, her dear Geneva teacher 
and friend, Miss Bradley, came to visit and cheer 
her, and, deferring other plans, remained for a time 
at Brockport, to assist her in teaching. 

Miss Mortimer writes Miss T. from — 

" Brockport, March 26, 1842. 

". . . Our examination has now become an old 
story and I think you would not be interested to hear 
further details. . . . We began school on Wednesday. 
My good girls have returned as bright as dollars, and a 
number of new ones about the same age. . . . The 
school, thus early in the term, numbers 126. In addition 
to the studies pursued last term, Miss Bradley has 
Chemistry, Botany, Physiology, and I have Aber- 
crombie. 

" Sabbath Evening. 

"I have been talking to M. A. until she does not 
want to listen to me any longer, and so I turn to you. 
. . . We have been talking of faith. ... I fear I do 
not know what faith is, and yet I know it is the very 
thing I need. How shall I obtain it ? You will tell 
me to pray. Alas ! how can I without first possessing 
faith? What then can I do? — Nothing. There is 
the stumbling-stone. Christ is all and in all, and even 
trust in Him is a gift, and that gift obtained by no 
effort of ours, because without the gift we should never 
seek it. How mysterious to the human understanding 
is godliness, and yet, even to that understanding, en- 
lightened, how glorious ! But enough, my dear con- 
fessor. I trust the spirit of grace will yet dispel the 
cloud and enable us to rejoice together." 
4 



34 MARY MORTIMER. 

A long cherished project with Miss Thurston 
and Miss Mortimer had been that of setting up a 
new school together. Though temporarily in the 
background, it had not at this time been relin- 
quished. 

"What" writes Miss M. "shall I tell Mr. B. 
when he asks me about remaining here? A definite 
answer must be given soon. The citizens are more 
than ever engaged since the examination. Our 
grounds are being laid out in great style, with 
parks, etc., etc. I am glad you have written for 
Mr. N. I have not, and have not time. I will try, 
however, to have an article ready for July. My 
' thinking class ' was very popular, and the young 
ladies are anxious to have a class again this term. 
1 find two extracts from Mrs. R. 's Philosophy over 
her name in the Evangelist." 

" Brockport, April 7, 1842. 
'We are both as much occupied, for aught I see, as 
I was last term. ... I think with regard to your com- 
ing here, our situation would be, on many accounts, 

pleasant. . . . Mrs. is disturbed at the thought 

of my going away, and tells me that here is a fine field 
for doing good, and inquires if you could not be pre- 
vailed upon to come. . . . Mrs. R.'s Philosophy is 
wondrously recommended, is it not ? I think it will 
get into favor and use too, for which I shall be heartily 
glad. 

"We will endeavor to discover you in your incognito 



THE PREPARATION. 35 

in the Observer. How comes on the book you were to 
write ? " 

The failing health of Miss Mortimer decided her 
that she could not remain long in the responsible 
position to which she had been invited at Brock- 
port ; and without unduly urging Miss Thurston to 
take the place which she felt she must relinquish 
soon, she yet presented the opportunity for useful- 
ness and the pleasant aspects of the work so win- 
somely that Miss Thurston finally decided to enter 
upon it. 

Miss Mortimer wrote from — 

"Brockport, June 4, 1842. 
"I might, without any great stretch, be glowing upon 
the attention and good feeling which is, and will be, 
manifested by the best class of persons here. As to 
usefulness, I will not say that I would not far better 
like to be more by ourselves, but really I do not think 
we could have a much better field to do good in. You 
can, in this village, exert an influence, an extensive one 
if you wish, even aside from school. . . . We have one 
of the best of boarding places, and that, too, without 
any care or anxiety on our part." 

Miss Mortimer was not unwilling to remain and 
attempt the instruction of a few classes, though 
feeling strongly the uncertain tenure of her work. 
She much desired that her friend, Miss Bradley, 
should remain, as a permanent assistant to Miss 
Thurston. It was, however, finally decided that 



36 MARY MORTIMER. 

Misses Thurston and Mortimer should have the 
charge of literary instruction and Miss Frances 
Collier, of New York, that of the music department. 
Miss Bradley turned her thoughts to her plan of 
going West, formed before she went to Brockport. 

The correspondence during these years which 
is not quoted, shows great growth in independent 
action, an ever loyal affection for Miss Thurston 
with, consciously or unconsciously, a wide departure 
from her in modes of thought and action. Here 
Miss Mortimer formed a deep and influential attach- 
ment to Miss Collier, their young associate teacher. 
Incidentally, the enthusiasm of a lover of Nature in 
its sublimest moods is shown by her reference to a 
visit, in company with Miss Bradley and other 
friends, to Niagara Falls, and her offer, though in 
ill health and with limited purse, to repeat the visit 
soon with Miss Thurston. Her practical faculty in 
the management of school affairs, her wide sym- 
pathies, and the deep impression she is making on 
the best minds with which she comes in contact, 
are evidently growing with opportunity. 

Her prized associate and friend, Miss Frances 
Collier, now Mrs. L. S. Bannister, wrote of this 
period : — 

"It was sometime in the late Autumn of 1841 that 
Miss Mortimer left Geneva, and entered upon new and 
arduous duties in the organization of the ' Collegiate 
Institute ' at Brockport, N. Y. In this work she was 
associated with Mr. Julius Bates, a man peculiarly 



THE PREPARATION. 37 

fitted to grapple with the duties of a new enterprise, 
and with a band of teachers who co-operated with him 
most earnestly, and who will be long and gratefully re- 
membered by many pupils of the Institution, now 
scattered far and wide, who were there trained and 
girded for the great battle of life. Miss Mortimer en- 
tered upon this new sphere of labor with all the bound- 
less enthusiasm of her nature. Difficulties only seemed 
to arouse her untiring energies. It was at this time that 
looking out upon the future, which lay spread before 
her like a book with its fair pages all unwritten, she in- 
scribed upon its opening leaf these words, which reveal 
something of her life-purpose : — 

"'Free as I am from domestic cares, and in one 
sense from family ties, I feel that I should devote my- 
self to the good of others ; that I should enter heart 
and hand into the vineyard of the Lord; not to be a 
looker-on, not to labor for myself, but for Him.' 

"And again, 'Great God, I bless Thee that it is 
thine to will and to do, of thine own good pleasure.' 
Oh ! will in me such graces and such affections as shall 
enable me aright to perform the duties before me. May 
the anxiety I feel for success be purified from every- 
thing earthly, and may it be manifested forth in labors 
of love, in labor for Thee, O most blessed Saviour.'" 

The winter of her second year at Brockport 
(1842-3) found Miss Mortimer at the home of her 
sister in Phelps, for a time too ill to remain in 
school. In the spring she went to Geneva to con- 
sult a physician, and later, made a visit to her 
friends, Miss Ingham and Miss L. A. Seymour, at 



38 MARY MORTIMER. 

Le Roy Female Seminary. Returning to Brock- 
port, where she spent a short time, the early sum- 
mer finds her again in Phelps, whence she writes, 
giving a picture of traveling in the dawn of modern 
methods of locomotion. 

" Phelps, June 8, 1843. 
" I am really in Phelps, after a journey so unroman- 
tic, undangerous, etc., that it is hardly worthy of being 
referred to. . . . When I arrived at the boat, ' Sir 
Henry/ I found two ministers of our acquaintance 
among the passengers. The boat began to move. I 
kissed the children good-bye and they left me. I put 
myself at the window to take a last look at them 
and the renowned town of B. . . . We sailed on to 
Rochester as people are wont in the packet. The 
ministers talked about General Assembly, marrying a 
deceased wife's sister, theological seminary, etc., etc., 
and I talked, — till at length we arrived. Mr. S. 
went out to find a carriage, and we proceeded to the 
National Temperance Hotel. We had but little time 
before the cars left. I thought, however, I would try 
to see the doctor. . . . We reached Oak's Corners 
about four, where I was set out with my baggage. 
Mr. G. looked around in some apparent dismay and 
inquired if no one was to meet me. I told him not to 
be troubled, as I could get along very well, so, as he 
could not help, he jumped into the cars and away they 
went, leaving me standing in the middle of the road. 
... I limped to the nearest house and stepped within 
the gate, when who should appear but P. and her 
husband, coming to my relief. . . . Since that momen- 
tous day I have been trying to get well. ... I have 



THE PREPARATION. 39 

got a crutch, but do not like it and think I shall not 
use it." 

This letter refers to a mysterious lameness which 
had settled in her right hand and foot, and which 
became her chief disability, involving intense suf- 
fering, and finally severing her connection with 
Brockport. This trouble followed her for some 
time, but proved not to be permanent, although 
her right hand and arm were never after entirely 
recovered, and occasionally she was under the ne- 
cessity, even many years later, of writing with pen 
in her left hand for months at a time. 

In the same letter : — 

"I have begun the 'Life of Brainerd.' ... I will 
think of you in reading it, and of your desire in giving 
it to me." 

Two days later : — 

"I sat up last night and read Brainerd. I pondered, 
my dear friend, but knew not what to think. He must 
have been a holy man, but am I wrong in asking, Was 
there no undue enthusiasm about him, or excitement? 
Or does this question arise from my being so far from 
right, my heart so cold ? " 

" Phelps, June 15, 1843. 
"I read Brainerd last evening, — during his last sick- 
ness, — and the epistle of John, until rather late for my 
present good habits, and found it quite an effort to 
stop. ... I felt more than I have done for several 
months. . . . My heart was pretty well melted, and I 



40 mary Mortimer. 

felt some desire, I trust earnest and humble, to live a 
different life, — a life of devotion to Him who has, year 
after year, spared the barren fig tree. O ! how infinite 
is His love and mercy. ..." 

To Miss Collier : — 

"I wish very much that I could see you. ... I am 
very nearly well enough to go to New York, at least I 
should not feel much hesitation in going on account of 
my health. ... I will meet you at Auburn, and, if I 
go, go on immediately as fast as steam will carry us. 
... I trust you will be safely landed at your own dear 
home. I shall be very happy to see you there. The 
day has been when the sight of others at home reminded 
me too painfully of my loss, . . . but my heart is better 
schooled now, and I look only with pleasure on that 
dearest, brightest picture of earth." 

New York, July 14, 1843. 

" More than two weeks have elapsed since we reached 
this city. My health is much improved but my foot 
remains about the same. ... I do so want it to get 
well. So far as I am able to judge, I improve at Phelps 
faster than anywhere else I have been. Avon I have 
not yet tried." 

"Newark, July 25, 1843. 

" I have of late felt a little discouraged. . . . This, 
as well as the Doctor's prescription, seems to forbid my 
returning to Brockport. ... I have rather decided it 
not safe for me to teach at present, but as, not know- 
ing your movements, I can lay no plan to see you on 
the way, I think I shall go on to Brockport with F., 
and then I trust no untoward circumstances will prevent 



THE PREPARATION. 41 

our consulting together and laying plans for the future. 
Our present design is to leave New York next Monday 
morning, take the packet at Schenectady and proceed 
as fast as that will take us to B . ..." 

After a visit to L e Roy : — 

"Avon, Aug. 15, 1843. 

"I am actually at Avon Springs, and have drunk a 
glass and a half of its famed water. . . . After you left 
me (at Le Roy), Miss I. came and gave me a very 
warm welcome. Sabbath she gave me < Philosophy of 
the Plan of Salvation ' to read — a very philosophic 
book, by the way. . . . Monday went to examination, 
which went on considerably after our fashion. . . . By 
the time we left the schoolroom a great company was 
assembled in the parlor to all of whom I had to be pre- 
sented. . . . Music, talking, etc., etc., were going on, 
when I, a little sad and weary, laid hold of Miss S. 
and begged to withdraw, which being accomplished, I 
finished my book, and thought upon the delights of 
peace and quiet, and much more which I will not ex- 
plain. . . . This morning I resolutely announced my 
determination to proceed to Avon without delay. . . . 
The stage left me a mile and a half from here, but I got 
a horse and buggy and came on. ... I rather like the 
looks of things. ... I can be comfortable, even happy 
here, and do very much as I please. I am very near 
the lower Spring to which I have walked once. This 
is not, I presume, a fashionable place, though I think I 
shall like it better than a fashionable one. ..." 

"I am being tried, though not very cruelly so, and 1 
do trust the process will be purifying ; indeed I feel 



42 MARY MORTIMER. 

that it has done something, that it will do more. I 
think I never realize temporal blessings so much as 
when out of health, but while these, among which the 
dearest have been the love and kindness of friends, 
have been a comfort, my plans have been frustrated, 
my energies have almost evaporated, my hopes again 
and again been blasted, until it seems to me I have, to 
some small extent, learned the lesson my Father would 
teach me." 

Notwithstanding her fears, some temporary re- 
cuperation found Miss Mortimer again at Brockport 
in the fall term. But by midwinter she was again 
in need of the rest and change afforded by a visit 
to her friends at Phelps and Auburn. 

She writes from — 

"Auburn, Tues., Jan. 23, 1844. 

"At the Corners, found S. awaiting me. . . . 
Yesterday morning S. and I took a ride of a few 
miles and after dinner came to this village. I seemed 
to get better every mile, and if I could ride far enough, 
think I should get quite well. . . . 

" Tis very nice to be at home, though I believe that 
word, at this era of my life applies better to the spot 
where you, my dear friend, and the school are, than 
anywhere else. I will try to keep very quiet and happy 
and get well as fast as possible. . . . Perhaps I shall 
go to Geneva to spend next Sabbath. . . . Remember 
me very affectionately to the young ladies and tell 
them they are much in my mind." 

In the early spring of 1844 Miss Thurston was 
suddenly and finally called from the school in 



THE PREPARATION. 43 

Brockport, by a bereavement which fell on the 
household of her brother in the death of his wife. 
Miss Mortimer remained for a few months in charge 
of the work, but with sufficient physical disability 
to look without doubt on the necessity of abandon- 
ing her post ere long. 

To Miss T. : — 

Brockport, May 13, 1844. 

" How are you getting along in your solitary home ? 
I trust peace and joy will beam around your desolate 
fireside. . . . 

" My school-keeping without you gets on but sadly, 
and my heart is, in consequence, often oppressed. It 
is a fearful thing to have such responsibility resting 
upon one. . . . Need I tell you that my heart is cold, 
that I get through the business of the day as the current 
leads me, but with so little heart that I am almost star- 
tled sometimes ? I have, a few times, in Bible class or 
on similar occasions, felt a gushing forth of feeling, 
and an interest which enabled me to speak with some 
ease and earnestness upon that which interests us all so 
nearly, but how soon it is gone. . . . 

" Our catalogue we send you. . . . We keep you in 
it still, you see. ..." 

After vacation and a visit to Miss T. : — 

"Brockport, Aug. 12, 1844. 
"I am, as you may imagine, tired and solitary, in- 
deed feel this morning exceedingly unfitted for the 
labors of the day. My school-symptoms are fast creep- 
ing over me, and I could cry in sorrow at the thought. 



44 MARY MORTIMER. 

O, it is nice to feel bright and well and to be in school 
too, but I cannot seem to reconcile the two things." 

Soon the inevitable decision was made to leave 
the school, its pupils and friends, and the place 
which, notwithstanding constant interruption on 
account of illness, in the nearly three years since 
she came to it, had become endeared to her. The 
home of her sister, Mrs. Bannister, was the refuge 
to which she looked forward for the winter. A 
few of her pupils wished to follow her into her re- 
tirement, and it was finally arranged that her friend 
and associate, Miss Collier, should accompany her, 
and that the young ladies should be received as 
pupils, these with their teachers occupying a house 
near Mrs. Bannister's but all becoming a part of 
the family and gathering around the home-table. 
This prospect of having something to do, yet being 
in her sister's family, and free from the cares of 
more responsible station, was to Miss Mortimer, in 
her invalid state, most attractive. She wrote 
from — 

" Brockport, Oct. 16, 1844. 

"How rich I shall be, — friends, books, sisters, 
home, everything ! . . . I am getting impatient to get 
away from school, I feel so badly. Perhaps I shall not 
stay till close of the term." 

In the same letter, Miss Collier wrote : — 

"Four weeks from to-night we bid adieu to school, 
and in a day or two, to Brockport. I cannot realize 



THE PREPARATION. 45 

that I am so soon to leave, perhaps forever, the spot 
where I have been so happy, where I have found dear 
friends who will hold a place in my heart as long as I 
live. But so it is. I did not care to come in search of 
friends or happiness, and here I have found both." 

Miss Mortimer's last letter addressed to Miss 
T. from Brockport Collegiate Institution is dated — 

"Oct. 30, 1844. 
"Thank you a thousand times, my dear sister, for 
your sympathy. I feel badly, as you know, sometimes, 
over my prostrate health and blighted hopes, but I have 
very much for which to be thankful. I feel comfort- 
able, even bright, when I have nothing to tax my wits, 
or my feelings. I have the very comforts of life I love 
best, and more than all besides, the blessing I so long, 
so earnestly sighed for, — a revelation from the Author 
of all. The winter if no unforeseen event occurs to 
mar our happiness, can be but pleasant and quiet. Turn 
away then, from my sorrows, and sympathize with me 
in my joys." 

One of the band associated with Miss Mortimer 
in this happy winter gives the following graphic 
picture : — 

"In the fall of 1844 Miss Mortimer origniated and ma- 
tured a plan for the winter which, while it furnished her 
with congenial employment, proved both pleasant and 
profitable to a class of a half dozen young ladies who 
enjoyed the advantages of her instruction. This ' band 
of sisters' was domiciled for the winter in a quiet 
farm-house a few miles distant from one of the beautiful 



46 MARY MORTIMER. 

villages in Western New York. There, shut in by the 
wintry snows, sometimes for days cut off from all inter- 
course with the outside world, they devoted themselves 
to study, with all the ardor of their own youthful 
minds, inspired to extraordinary effort by the enthu- 
siasm of their teacher. The amount of mental labor 
achieved during their four months session by that little 
group of students would be considered simply incred- 
ible by the average young lady. It was a grand finish- 
ing-school, or rather, a grand preparatory course, for 
those who were looking forward to teaching as their 
work. The hours of severer study in Metaphysics and 
Mathematics were pleasantly relieved by a course in 
Modern History, and, at stated times, lessons in Music, 
French and Drawing afforded a healthful and much 
needed change. 

"When the hours of study for the day were ended, 
exercise and play were the order, and no one was 
excused. When the weather did not admit of a walk, 
the old porch furnished out-door promenade, and the 
chance passer-by must sometimes have been startled 
with the ring of merry voices and the rapid tramp of 
many feet under the shelter of the piazza. 

"The little children of the family had their part in 
the programme, and when the hours of freedom came, 
gladly turned from conning their Geography and Multi- 
plication-table to the delights of sledding and snow- 
balling and hunting eggs in the barn. 

"In the evening, study was renewed for two hours, 
and all retired early to their well-earned rest, for no 
midnight oil was consumed in that well-ordered house- 
hold. 



THE PREPARATION. 47 

"Nor were there wanting seasons of social festivity, 
a gathering of neighbors in the parlor who enjoyed a 
song or a lively piece of music as a rare treat ; a quilt- 
ing-bee, an occasional sleigh-ride, when the silence of 
the winter evening was broken by the sound of happy 
voices, mingling with the merry peal of the sleigh-bells. 
At Thanksgiving, a large party was gathered around a 
bountiful repast at the hospitable mansion of a friend 
in a neighboring village. And early in the spring, 
when the snow melted and the sap began to run, there 
was a ' sugaring off' in the 'maple-bush' which afforded 
a sweet and novel entertainment to some members of 
that happy party who had never before been initiated 
into the mysteries of country life. 

"But why dwell on these vanished scenes? They 
passed away, as bright things will, and are now remem- 
bered by the surviving ones of that band of seven, as a 
pleasant dream. The spring came, they parted, to 
meet no more an unbroken band, on this side Heaven." 

From the home of her eldest brother, Miss 

Mortimer writes : — 

"Auburn, April 8, 1845. 
" Our winter has passed on the whole pleasantly and, 
I trust, profitably, and now, our nice little home-school 
is numbered with the things that were." 

"Saturday p. m., May 4, 1845. 
"I am alone in many respects to-day, and yet, not 
alone. My brother is so good, kind and sympathetic. 
I think of the young man in the Gospel, and feel 
happy in the reflection that, though essentially wrong, 
yet even Jesus loved him. . . . Our future is very dark 



48 MARY MORTIMER. 

and unsettled is it not ? You are tied to your children 
and your housekeeping, and I am hampered with lame- 
ness. . . . I have been reading Prof. Bush on the Resur- 
rection. Do read it, if you can get it, and let me know 
your opinion. ... I have ridden about considerably 
and been very leisurely and feel somewhat recruited, 
still my arm and foot are far from well." 

After a visit with Miss T. : — 

"Auburn, July 17, 1845. 

" I returned on Tuesday in order to get (or be got) 
ready to go East, which I have pretty much decided 

to do." 

" New York, Sept. 22, 1845. 

"My health, though better than at B., seems not 
much affected by my medicine. I am pining for love 
and sympathy and something to do. How dark is our 
earth without these solaces. ... I have been reading 
Carlyle, and it seems to me it has done me good. 
Truth as the good, the one object of life, has risen 
most brightly and beautifully before me, and I have 
longed to be freed from the dominion of falsehood, 
from sin and evil and to be made pure, free, true, like 
Him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life. ... I 
did not go to the seashore, because, poor, lone damsel 
as I was, I did not know where to go. . . . That 
Illinois school I wish we could go to. I wonder if they 
would have F. and me next spring. ... I am very 
anxious to get to work, as soon as I can. Tell me 
what you think I had better do next winter." 

"Auburn, Nov. 15, 1845. 

"My journey is safely accomplished and here I am 
again, after an absence of fifteen weeks — how much 
better in health for my journeyings, medicines, etc., I 



THE PREPARATION. 49 

cannot tell. . . . The Doctor still speaks confidently 
of my recovery. . . . My winter will, I trust, be passed 
pleasantly and profitably, though I do not feel very 
sanguine. 

"Mr. and Mrs. C. have been very kind and atten- 
tive, and I have left them very much impressed with 
their goodness." 

"Auburn, Dec. 4, 1845. 

". . . My own heart, as I have hinted before, has 
been in a strange, sad state for months past. An effort 
to awake I have seemed to make, but the chains of sin, 
of ignorance, of darkness are strong, and firmly they 
hold me down. Life, Religion, what they should be 
have seemed dimly to rise before me, and a struggle 
has been in my heart in which it sometimes seems 
doubtful whether corruption or grace would gain the 
victory. I read Carlyle until I grew so excited I dared 
read no farther, and I took up St. Pierre's ' Harmonies 
of Nature' and grew calmer." 

Miss Mortimer had been entirely released from 
her connection with Brockport for over a year and 
had been diligently using means for recovering her 
health, but with only partial success. The winter 
of 1844-5 sne na d spent, as we have seen, in the 
shelter of the home of her sister and brother-in- 
law, Mr. L. S. Bannister, on a farm near Phelps, 
with congenial friends and a few private pupils 
around her. The winter of 1845-6, was spent in 
the home of her brother, Mr. Edmund Mortimer in 
Auburn, and the occupation she needed was sup- 
plied by a little home-school in which his children 

5 



50 MARY MORTIMER. 

were pupils. At this time, December 1845, sne 
had received an invitation to return to the charge 
of the ladies' department of the school in Brock- 
port, and also one to enter Le Roy Female Semi- 
nary as an instructor. 

The tidings of the death of the Principal of 
Brockport Institute, Mr. Julius Bates, after a brief 
illness in the previous autumn, had saddened the 
hearts of the teachers who had been associated with 
him. To Miss Thurston, Miss Mortimer writes at 
this time : — 

"You propose to go to Brockport. I wish I could 
go with you, but this cannot be. Your visit I shall be 
able to picture to myself. It will be sad, but sweet. 
God grant you may be able to comfort the lone widow 
in her sorrow and desolation. Oh, how you will miss 
him who is gone forever ! It seems to me Brockport 
would be most sad and desolate, and yet, as I read Mr. 
L.'s letter, my very heart yearned to say Yea to his 
application. His proposal seemed very kind and con- 
siderate of my health, and I was strongly tempted to 
accept. But I feared for my health . . . and so I 
declined. 

" Miss S.'s proposition seemed very fair (to go to Le 
Roy) . . . and I really feel honored by it, and though 
I feel some misgivings, I am disposed to accept. . . . 
I have written, stating the case I am in now, and re- 
questing them to reconsider, to weigh my capability or 
rather want of capability for the proposed post, . . . 
and then if I must, I will reply definitely. 

"My promises which are in the way are to F., to 



THE PREPARATION. 51 

brother John, to whom I had written recently, offering 
to go West and teach, provided he will teach with me, 
and an offer I have made here, too. Pray do venture a 
little advice, for I am at a loss what to do. ... I 
have commenced teaching the children, and hope to 
pass the winter pleasantly, though I shall be lonely. I 
do believe I am better. My foot is certainly much 
better, and by spring I hope for quite a renovation." 

"Auburn, last day of 1845. 

". . . It is eight years since I resolved to be a 
Christian, and this, the anniversary of the most sol- 
emn day of my life, never comes without exciting in 
my breast deep emotion, and to-day there is much to 
make me feel more than usual. As I tried to describe 
to you in my last, I have been, for months past, more 
excited than for five or six years. Life, it seems 
to me, has risen more clearly to my view, and I have 
seen and tried to see more what a Christian's should 
be ; and a deeper, clearer desire to live for God, for 
truth, has sprung up in my heart. I say not this, my 
truest friend, to make you think I am good, or even 
better. Ah, no, my heart is evil and only evil, except 
as the blessed Spirit puts in it good desires. If any 
right feeling be there, I would give Him the praise, and 
be lowly. 

"But you do not understand me. I have not been 
running away into any heresies. Carlyle has done me 
no harm, but, I trust, good, and I bless God for the 
book, — it has helped to wake me up, to lead me to look 
deeper, to see farther. . . . Swedenborg, too, has 
aided. ... Be not alarmed. I am neither Sweden- 
borgian nor Carlylian, but, I hope, a seeker after truth, 



52 MARY MORTIMER. 

and I trust, whenever I find it, in whatever garb, I shall 
embrace it and love it. . . . 

" Permit me while on this to say, you and I, my 
dear sister, are differently constituted and you do not 
always fairly appreciate me. I have never wavered in 
the creed which, by the blessing of God, you aided me 
to adopt, but I never believed, and do not now, that it 
is ' the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
truth,' and still I would seek, remembering that I am 
fallible and always was, — and the Westminster Assem- 
bly of divines were, too, fallible, erring, creatures. . . . 
It is not my nature to turn away from contending opin- 
ions and settle down that because I have the Bible and 
the creed-book in my hands, I have the truth, and 
need look no further. 

"Understand me now, with reverence would I say it: 
I believe the Bible to be ' the truth, the whole truth and 
nothing but the truth,' at least in religion, but then, my 
views of it are liable to be wrong, to be superficial, and 
if other minds can aid me to draw from this fountain, 
truth, should I not gratefully accept the boon ? Let me 
ask you then to be patient, to be forbearing with me, if 
I seek among so-called heretics and heresies for truth ; if 
I sometimes eulogize them and their doctrines, and get 
excited over their sayings. Seek not, my ever faithful 
friend, to turn me from a course which my reason tells 
me is right, but pray for me in my search, sympathize 
with me so far as you can, and tell me if I wander from 
the pole-star, the Bible." 

The same letter announces her acceptance of the 
invitation to teach in Le Roy : — 



THE PREPARATION. 53 

" I sent last week an affirmative reply. Whether or 
not I shall like my post I know not. I do not feel very 
sanguine, and yet I am hopeful. May God go with me 
and make me a blessing. Miss S. inquires if I can go 
in the early part of February. I have written saying I 
would prefer to go later, and proposing, instead, the 
first of March. ... I feel more quiet and happy than 
when I last wrote you, and get along pretty comfortably 
here, — get out of patience sometimes with my children, 
which is naughty. ... I shall think much of you and 
our dear M. A. to-day and to-morrow." 

"Female Seminary, Le Roy, March 13, 1846. 
" Here I am, safely ensconced once more in school. 
I am happy, and yet not altogether so. . . . Your 
children, whom you have watched so carefully, so faith- 
fully, whom you have loved so fondly for two long 
years, you expect soon to be called to leave. . . . We, 
my dear sister, have outlived our dearest earthly bless- 
ings, our earliest and best friends ; health and home 
have fled ; the warmth and fervor of our hopes are 
chilled, the blessing we prized more than life has been 
torn from our grasp, and with blighted hearts we have 
looked out on the world. Why have we not more 
deeply learned the lesson thus set before us — to cease 
fixing our hearts on the perishing things of earth ? . . . 
You will gather strength as you commit all to Him, 
and yet I know the parting will be painful, deeply so. 
Your sweet little C, what will she do without Aunty? 
May our Father watch over both, and perfect in M. the 
good work which seems begun." 



54 MARY MORTIMER. 

"Le Roy, Dec. 6, 1846. 

"I feel sad this morning, for the warmest feelings of 
my heart have been checked. They find no resting 
place ; the picture of beauty within me is defaced, yet 
I am not very unhappy. My spirit is quiet, — almost, 
it seems to me, resigned to whatever shall come. Would 
that I could, in recalling the past, feel that I have acted 
nobly, honorably, but I cannot. It is darkened all 
over, and peace, of which I have been thinking and 
talking this morning, could never be mine were it not 
that an all-sufficient atonement has been made for me. 
On that atonement, with you, my friend, I would rely, 
and in it, I am happy. . , . Oh, my heart does warm 
with the thought that our evil nature can be subdued, 
that the day will come when all shall be overcome, and 
life and light and truth and love shall burst upon us, 
and no discord shall be produced. . . . Pride shall be 
overcome, and selfishness and ignorance, and all sin. 
For this great, this blessed object, it seems to me I 
would endure anything. Trials I will not shrink from, 
but rejoice in them if they are what is needed to sub- 
due me, to bring me submissive to the feet of Jesus. 
Nay, let them come, let my heart be lacerated, every 
other joy wither at my side; if Jesus and Truth but 
remain, it is enough. . . . 

"I am trying to teach my Bible class Romans. Is 
it presumptuous? It has, I think, done me good, what- 
ever may be the case with them. What a clear, forci- 
ble argument it is ! We commenced the fifth chapter 
this morning, stopped upon peace, and used up our 
allowance of time upon it. It is blessed to teach, — to 
teach the Bible thus, — best of all, if one can teach her- 



THE PREPARATION. 55 

self. I have a little feared to come to the eighth and 
ninth chapters, but I am getting over my fears, for the 
way grows brighter and clearer with each succeeding 
lesson, and I fear not to teach any one any doctrine I 
see thus clearly as thus far I see, and substantiated as 
all has been. Pray for us that good may be done." 

The perennial fervor and the deep insight which 

the foregoing letter reveals, were marked at this time 

as in a period of rich mental and moral growth. 

Fifteen years afterward Miss Mortimer handed to 

the writer of these pages a volume, — "Chalmers, 

Commentary on Romans," — referring to it as having 

been a most profitable guide in this Bible class, 

and describing the pleasure and the profit of the 

teacher and the enthusiasm of the pupils, with 

a vividness that left an abiding picture in the 

memory. 

"Phelps, July 18, 1847. 

"I have grown calmer, especially for the last few 
months, and perhaps look upon life more rationally, 
but I fear that in the calming, rationalizing process I 
I have lost something of my warmth and fervor, and yet, 
I hope not. This one thing cheers me in view of my 
cold, evil heart : Truth arouses its warmth, and it 
seems to me I can live and suffer and die and spend a 
blessed eternity in contemplation of its majestic beauty. 
More and more clearly do I see and feel that Chris- 
tianity is truth, and, I trust, more warmly does my 
heart burn with gratitude to Him who led me to believe 
this blessed truth, who, by his own infinite sufferings 
made it possible for you, my dear friend, for me, for 



56 MARY MORTIMER. 

the world, to become partaker of its rich blessings. . . . 

I heard Mr. preach to-day, a sort of sectarian 

sermon. Alas, for the Church in general ! It seems 
as if many people think they are going to heaven on 
Methodism, or Baptism, or Presbyterianism, or some 
other ism, instead of Christ, the only name given under 
heaven among men whereby they can be saved. ..." 

" Phelps, Sep. 15, 1847. 
"The people around me are talking about the [Mexi- 
can] war, — the blessed, heroic, defensive war of the 
nineteenth century. S. is contending that good may 
grow out of it. . . . 'The wrath of man shall praise 
our God,' and, as the iniquitous war in China has done 
good, spite of its injustice, so may this. . . . O, I 
long for the time when men shall open their eyes to the 
folly and wickedness of war, and shall rally round the 
standard of the great Immanuel to conquer their 
brothers by truth and righteousness instead of by swords 
and cannon. ... I expect to leave for Le Roy next 
Monday, — of course very much to my sorrow shall miss 
seeing you. ... I cannot delay, for I expect no teacher 
to take the lead will be at Le Roy except myself. [Miss 
Emily Ingham had become Mrs. Stanton in June pre- 
vious, and was now with her husband absent on a Euro- 
pean trip.] Mrs. Stanton at the last intelligence was 
in Paris, where she expected to remain until October, 
and then return. My health is sufficiently good, so 
that I feel no hesitation in returning to school, which 
promises to be very large. ... I design remaining at 
Le Roy only for this winter, still I may remain longer. 
I return to school, as usual, thankful that I may." 



THE PREPARATION. 



r ol 



"Le Roy, Oct. 14, 1847. 

"I have been thinking to-night how much more quiet 
and home-like you will be in your house than we are, 
and sighing to be by your side. I like not this excite- 
ment, and I believe some day I must bid it adieu, for it 
will wear me out. Amid it now I feel very much alone, 
for, one after another, my friends have passed away, 
until now none remain save a few who love me here. 
What a changing world ! How deeply have I loved 
you, and M. A., and F., and now where are you? Gone 
from me bodily and, almost, in spirit too, and once 
more I am as before, alone, and yet, blessed be the 
Father of all mercies, not alone, for he liveth and 
reigneth. . . . We have been three weeks in session, 
have the largest school I have ever known here ; our 
house is thronged. . . . Mr. and Mrs. S. were to sail 
about this time and we hope to greet them here in a few 
weeks. ... I am pretty well thus far, but am so full 
of business that I get very weary, and have some fears 
for the future. 

"We have one hundred and thirty scholars, and 
nearly seventy boarders besides teachers." 

"LeRoy, Jan. 17, 1848. 
"You remember ten years ago ? I do, most vividly, 
and bless God that I saw that period in my life, and 
that I saw you, and other dear faithful friends of that 
period. I have thought of the blessings bestowed upon 
me, and now, ten years after the vow I made that I 
would be a Christian, I do feel, more than then, how 
rich is the blessing bestowed, do feel that light has 
shone upon my pathway, — and now, all is so much 
clearer. Two or three years after that memorable 



58 MARY MORTIMER. 

winter, I read a discussion on Christianity, and found 
myself so far shaken that I was wretched, and sighed 
that Christianity was so far involved in difficulty. It is 
different now, and I can but rejoice, in deep gratitude, 
at the warm, blessed glow of feeling which now comes 
over me in view of the strength, the reasonableness, the 
fitness to our necessities, of Christianity. I wonder no 
longer that it is above me, I tremble no more in view 
of its seeming weakness, for it seems all strength, all 
light, so light it dazzles me. . . . My well days are 
over for this winter I fear, but I am in the harness and 
must try to hold on eleven weeks longer, and then I 
think I will rest again. . . . Various things impel me 
to think of turning my steps West or South, if I find 
myself recruited again after another rest." 

"Le Roy, Feb. 16, 1848. 

" I wish you would not work so incessantly. What 
Sabbaths. you must have, and how unfitted you must be, 
after such a day's labor, for the week ! Do, pray, look 
at yourself as you would another, and inquire into the 
right of your teaching out of your own family on the 
Sabbath, added to all the labors you have in it. I am 
worn out myself, and feel the more deeply on the sub- 
ject, and would fain know what, in the mighty labor to 
be done for this world, I can do. It seems to me I 
have a will to work, but the way I find not, or finding 
it, break down before I get well going. We have yet 
seven weeks, which I hope to live through without quite 
prostrating myself." 

"Le Roy, March 17, 1848. 

"Here we have continued to be afflicted until, last 
Saturday, death closed our last case of illness. A good 



THE PREPARATION. 59 

spirit is, we trust, hovering over us. A number think 
they have given themselves to the Saviour, but O, I 
tremble for them. Excitement, sympathy, these and 
other things affect them, and how often it is that the 
still, small voice of the Spirit is lost in the confusion of 
other voices. ... I am better than I was, but my 
strength is still overtaxed." 

" Phelps, June 12, 1848. 
"I want to see you very much for a variety of rea- 
sons, but you know, and so do I, that I am very prone 
to set about doing what I really desire to, hence I feel 
the necessity of putting the more curb upon my feel- 
ings. I look with some anxiety to the future, mainly, 
I trust, in the desire to make such an arrangement for 
myself as shall best secure my usefulness. I have no 
one to advise me. Do you, my dear friend, consider 
my case, my peculiarities, my health, and pray for wis- 
dom from above, and advise me what I should do. I 
feel weak, and yet I feel strong to cope with evil and 
falsehood, and I pray to be led forth into the wilder- 
ness to battle for Christ. Where shall I go ? What 
shall I do? Would it be safe and prudent for me to go 
West at a venture, visit Miss Seymour (now Mrs. Par- 
sons) and start a school wherever I might find a good 
opening ? I dare not hazard much expense without a 
fair prospect of success. I do not want boarders, and 
do not want a large school, but would very much like an 
advanced one, therefore it seems to me I would better 
go to a large place and establish a day-school. I pro- 
pose to be joined by Miss N., one of the Le Roy 
graduates of a year ago last spring. . . . Miss S. (Mrs. 
P.) talks of going to Milwaukee. . . . 



60 MARY MORTIMER. 

"I have of late read 'Vestiges of Creation,' — have 
you seen it ? I am now reading De Tocqueville's 
'Democracy in America/ and Tappan on the Will. 
De T. writes very finely. I wish all Americans with 
unprejudiced minds would read and consider." 

" Auburn, Thurs., July 25, 1848. 
". . . And now, my dear friend, you are cautious 
and true to me ; therefore earnestly and confidingly I 
appeal to you in regard to my proposed plan of going 
off to found a school. It seems to me if ever I desired 
to follow the leadings of Providence it is now ; that I go 
forth to do the will of my Heavenly Father, to seek 
to accomplish his purposes, and I would be guarded 
from acting rashly and unwisely. Time is most .pre- 
cious. I pray to be kept from any enterprise which 
shall trifle it away. Think of me and my plans, pray 
for me, and if any information come in your way con- 
cerning the West or South, please treasure it up for me." 

Thus far the correspondence quoted has been 
mostly from that with her early teacher and tried 
friend, Miss Thurston, who placed in the hands of 
the editor of this memoir a series of letters from 
Miss Mortimer rich in self-revelation, and covering, 
unbroken, a period of nearly forty years. The 
quotations which follow are from letters addressed 
to Miss Morilla E. Hill, a loved and trusted Le Roy 
pupil. 

As we have seen, Miss Mortimer was approaching 
a momentous decision, which was to take her far 
from the scenes and friends of her childhood and 



THE PREPARATION. 61 

youth, of her school days and her early teaching. 
Occupied as she was with the anxieties and duties 
attendant upon this decision, the welfare and use- 
fulness of the friends she was soon to leave filled a 
large share of her heart. Miss Thurston was now 
at the head of a private school for girls in Elmira, 
New York. Her incessant labors had been the 
theme of Miss Mortimer's remonstrance in passages 
already quoted from the correspondence. She 
visited Miss T. in July, 1848, and then exerted her 
influence (as both felt the mysterious leading of 
Miss Mortimer to the shaping of a school after her 
own ideals in some newer part of the country) 
toward the employment by Miss Thurston of one 
who should be a strong staff on which she could 
lean for help in her Elmira school. Miss Mortimer's 
relation to Miss Thurston was that of a pupil, a re- 
lation which gave color to her feeling of respect and 
gratitude while life lasted. Her relation to Miss 
Hill was that of a teacher, and yet her recognition 
of excellence was here one of admiration and love 
which amounted almost to reverence from the elder 
to the younger. 

Miss Mortimer writes Miss Hill, then teaching in 
Le Roy, under date — 

"Oak's Corners, June 5, 1848. 

"I shall not soon forget the glow of happiness which 

you have often been the means of bringing to my heart. 

Once ' a word in kindness spoken ' sent a thrill of agony 

through that heart. You expressed a prayer that I 



02 MARY MORTIMER. 



might have a friend who would be to me what I was to 
you. It was a simple wish, but the connection showed 
me that you meant much. ... A guide, a counsellor 
and friend — how much that word means to me ! May 
I strive to be such to you, and will you trust me fully 
enough to let me sympathize in your trials and aid you 
in the development of your deepest feelings ? You have 
often heard me express my belief in a higher kind of 
evidence than that of experience, but like the rest of 
this superficial world, I am very susceptible to this 
latter, and therefore have grown a little skeptical as to 
my meeting a realization of my ideas of friendship and 
sympathy ; indeed I have grown very doubtful whether 
it would be safe or happy for me to do so, and I leave 
it in my Father's hands. ... If there is one thing for 
which I am fitted, I believe it is to sympathize in sor- 
row, in trial, in feeling, and as I believe this is almost 
the channel to usefulness, I would cultivate this suscep- 
tibility. . . . You, body and soul, are in school, and 
want sympathy and counsel. The first you have, 
warmest and truest ; the second I cannot give you 
better than I have done. I do not flatter ; I hold you 
to be my superior, at least in conscientiousness and 
faith and a deep, fervent desire to live only for the 
good of others, and these, my dear sister, are the foun- 
dations, so far as may be within us, for usefulness. I 
more than believe, I feel that I know that your labors 
as a teacher will be blessed. Long and with ever- 
increasing interest have I studied your character, and 
the result has been that I love and admire you ; that as 
I look over this sinstricken world I bow in earnest 
gratitude that such laborers as yourself there are to go 
forth to bless it. Be not impatient with my eulogy ; it 



THE PREPARATION. 63 

is more moderate than I feel. I know, to your heart 
and understanding, more than this, different than this 
is needed, and I will not annoy you by ceasing to coun- 
sel you. Which of us is the wiser, it is of little conse- 
quence to decide. . . . 

"To the point then. You know I have tried to tell 
all my children what education is, what its aim should 
be, and you, at least, have obtained a better conception 
of the subject than my weak words embodied. Keep 
that conception ever in view — let everything you say 
and do tend to the great end. Many obstacles you will 
encounter, and plans which you could and would make 
you may not be able to carry out, but something you 
can do. I charge you, let not doubt of your own abilities, 
consciousness of your weakness and sinfulness, hinder 
you from what you can do, and what you see needs to 
be done. 

"Your paper I trust is flourishing and the Historical 
Society or some other among the seniors. . . . To 
you, as my friend, my sister, my fondly cherished 
pupil, my successor in labors I love more than life, to 
my well-remembered and well-beloved co-laborers in 
the same blessed work, to my dear pupils, I have much 
to say, — oh, that the heart could speak its feelings! 
that I could tell you all how deeply I sympathize with 
you, how earnestly I desire your highest good. Assure 
all of my undiminished regard and affection, and tell 
them I want to hear from them, very, very much. 
I hope the children will write me a long letter." 

"Oak's Corners, July 10, 1848. 
"How grateful I am that all seemed going on so 
pleasantly and profitably with you. You have even ex- 



64 MARY MORTIMER. 

ceeded a little my expectations, my dear. Present my 
best wishes, my warmest love to your two, — yes, three 
societies. ... I can but rejoice that I was not invited 
to become corresponding member of The Society of 
Novices, for I might, in my reckless canvassing of what 
I do not agree with, wound some sensitive one. . . . 
None the less, however, do I rejoice in its prosperity. 
. . . Your other society I feel very much interested in, 
and would take quite a journey to attend one of its 
meetings. Tell them to stand firm, to 'be not weary 
in well-doing' and they will be able to look back to this 
summer as the waking-up time of their lives. ... I 
think you have assumed a little too much in what I 
said, and really I do not feel that I could benefit you 
much by any advice which I could offer. In the sug- 
gestions which come to me, my memory is too good, — 
I remember to have made them before, and you have 
paid so good attention to your teacher, been so dis- 
posed to gather all the good that could be extracted 
from her instructions, that she feels there is no need of 
repeating them. Sympathy is always delightful in so 
trying, so responsible a life as a teacher's, and this you 
have warmly from me. Before the throne of Him who 
alone can sustain and guide and make you successful, 
you are not forgotten. ... I cannot, I think, consist- 
ently visit you this term, but shall perhaps pass through 
Rochester and Brockport on my way West about the 
last of August. Could y*>u meet me at one of those 
places?" 

" Elmira, Aug. 2, 1848. 
"... I am visiting my good friend, Miss Thurston, 
and we have been talking about school and about you. 



THE PREPARATION. 65 

You will remember that you assured me last spring you 
should not remain at Le Roy longer than the close of 
the present term. On the strength of this assurance I 
feel that I shall not be interfering if, once more, I try 
to get you here. I have told Mrs. S. that I would, if 
in her place, keep you as long as I could, and for the 
sake of the school I wish you might remain. If any- 
thing has induced you to do so, you will not consider 
me as in the least wishing to interfere with your de- 
cision. Lest, however, you have not thus concluded, I 
venture a proposal. Miss T. needs a teacher, — such 
an one as yourself. You see I still consider myself a 
judge in regard to you, and, notwithstanding your 
doubts, I will add, a truer, better one than yourself. 
... I know, at least, something of the worth of my 
last winter's best scholar, and have made Miss T. feel it. 
... I think it might be of great benefit to your future 
usefulness as a teacher, to labor for a season with Miss 
T. ... As to the services she would wish, you would 
be expected in the main to take charge of the mathemat- 
ics. You would probably need- to teach all the time in 
school hours, but out of school, you would, I think, be 
very much more at your ease, and very much less liable 
to interruption than heretofore. Miss T. will have only 
a family circle in her house ; herself the mother, her 
teachers older sisters, her [boarding] pupils probably 
not more than half a dozen, affectionate and happy. 
Will you come, and be as sister, as helpmeet to the 
friend of my youth and of my riper years, the friend to 
whom I am more indebted than any other? I love her, 
I love you, and as I wander far away, it will be a grate- 
ful solace to my heart to know that she has you to aid, 
6 



66 MARY MORTIMER. 

to comfort, to sympathize with her ; that you have her 
to guide, to support, to love and sympathize with you. 
But I would by no means urge you against duty. Con- 
sider and decide, and may the wisdom of Him who 
only is wise, direct you. . . . The school now, day- 
pupils and boarders, numbers about eighty. ... I 
have frankly stated my own wishes and desires, and 
given all necessary information, and now I leave the 
subject for your careful, prayerful consideration and 
decision. . . . The fullness of my esteem for you is 
not diminished, nor the warmth of my affection 
changed." 

Three notes to pupils under Miss Mortimer's 
charge in these years of early teaching have been 
preserved. One is an apology for words which she 
felt had caused undeserved pain, in terms of the 
deepest sorrow, and absolutely without self-justifi- 
cation. Her scorn of her own weakness is couched 
in expression which is one of the finest and most 
exquisite touches of the truthful portrait painted by 
her own hand in her correspondence. Another is 
addressed "To Our Example ; " a New Year's 
greeting full of appreciation and of cheer to a lovely 
but self-distrusting pupil. Still another is a ringing 
expostulation "to the young ladies of two halls, " 
on their thoughtless violation of necessary regula- 
tions, and reveals a side of Miss Mortimer's nature 
which doubtless suffered more in administering re- 
buke than those to whom it was addressed. But — 

" The graven flowers that wreathe the sword 
Make not the blade less keen." 



THE PREPARATION. 67 

The sensitive soul of the teacher, and the love with 
which her soul was overflowing, were not allowed 
to blind her to the demands of justice, nor to hold 
her back from so administering her trust as best to 
subserve the good of each and all. 

In the midst of farewells to kindred and friends, 
and of parting visits to the scenes of her labors at 
Brockport and Le Roy, Miss Mortimer addressed 
her old friend Miss Thurston a last line from the 
Empire State, describing a visit she had paid to 
Miss Hill and her parents, the interview which had 
resulted in a final decision that her loved friend and 
pupil should go to the assistance of her loved and 
respected teacher, and sealed the letter with the 
motto, "I've won ! " 

A last word she writes from — 

"Le Roy, Tues., Aug 29, 1848. 
"I am thinking this morning that I will write Mr. 
Hogarth (pastor at Geneva) for a letter of introduction 
to the Western Education Society, and have it ready to 
use in case of need. ... I feel well and ready, I trust, 
to fight for truth and righteousness. I have decided to 
go around by the lakes to Milwaukee. Do not forget to 
love and pray for 

"Your wandering but affectionate sister, 

"Mary." 



We have now glanced at the influence of heredity 
and environment which shaped Miss Mortimer's un- 
conscious life, — the traits transmitted to her by 
her English ancestors whose character was moulded 



68 MARY MORTIMER. 

by a thousand years of English history ; the storm 
and stress of the period in which she was born, and 
which, for aught we know, may have been the large 
factors in determining her peculiar mental and 
moral gifts ; we have seen her original and in- 
tense youth, in the midst of a most beautiful region 
of her adopted country, crushed under awful be- 
reavement ; we have followed the struggles of a 
mind not inherently unbelieving but demanding the 
full satisfaction of her reasoning powers, and have 
looked with sympathy upon her remarkably vivid 
picture of the climax of those struggles when 
reason, aided by faith and by human friendship 
and Divine guidance, made life-long surrender of 
her whole being to the truth of Revelation. 

"To love truth for truth's sake" says Locke, 
" is the principal part of human perfection in this 
world, and the seed plot of all other virtues." This 
was the rich attainment of Miss Mortimer's young 
womanhood. She had been led to the wicket-gate 
of truth by the hand of friendship, but once entered 
on its boundless domain, she expatiated therein 
with endless delight, never losing sight of her 
"pole-star" of revelation, fearlessly investigating 
on every side, incapable of being cramped by human 
tradition or even of being held to any narrowness of 
interpretation by loving hands. 

Her mental and physical faculties matured 
rapidly under the discipline of study and of her 
early teaching ; with surprising docility gathering 



THE PREPARATION. 69 

the best from every source, and while still seeking 
support and guidance from friends and books, she 
reached, consciously and unconsciously, that plane 
where a wider field of action was a necessity. For 
this wider field she had been prepared, too, in her 
deepest heart-life. By friendship, by disappoint- 
ments, by loss of health, by the responsibilities at- 
tendant upon her teaching, especially in the measure 
of her independence in instruction at Brockport and 
Le Roy, the undisciplined vehemence of her youth 
had been brought into subjection, chastened and 
elevated, largely controlled, and made an instru- 
ment of incalculable power for good in her relation 
to others. Her unwavering loyalty and devotion to 
Christianity in the person of Christ, brought into 
her soul its richest fruit, union with the object of 
its fealty, growth in clearness of vision, and an all- 
encompassing love. 

Her sensitive self-distrust, though not conquered, 
was rendered less obstructive to her influence by 
experience ; and she was now, in the prime of early 
womanhood, increasingly able to live without un- 
due dependence upon friends, and to repose con- 
fidence in her power to win the love of her pupils, 
and the respect of their guardians. Her health, 
though not good, was better than formerly, and 
with experience in illness she had gained more 
ability to care for her physical needs, and more tri- 
umph over physical disabilities. The soul rose su- 
perior to the body ; to the imperious demands of 



70 • MARY MORTIMER. 

the heart, even, except as that heart might lean 
upon the friendship of the Highest Friend ; and to 
the ties which bound it to the region where all her 
conscious life had been spent, and where her kin- 
dred and the friends of her youth and womanhood 
were to remain. 

Some of her acquaintances had gone forth into 
the great South and the new West ; there was 
much need in this moral wilderness — a field for a 
hero. There, too, independence beckoned, free- 
dom to shape a school after her own ideals. But 
the field was all unknown before her ; she had no 
powerful friends to smooth her pathway ; she was 
hampered by a weak body and a straightened 
purse. 

How touching her teachableness, her appeals for 
the advice and prayers of her friend ! Yet the 
tendrils which bound her soul to those she had 
loved — and still loved — had been torn loose. 
She had learned "to suffer and be strong." 

She sets forth for the unknown West alone, and 
not knowing whither she goes. 



PART II, 



THE LIFE WORK 



"A dangerous tendency of civilization is that toward 
crystallization, — toward hardened, inflexible conven- 
tionalisms which refuse the soul its way. 

"Such crystallization, such conventionalisms, yield 
only to the dissolving power of the spiritual warmth of 
life-full personalities. 

"Only the man who supplies new feeling fresh from 
God, quickens and regenerates the race and sets it on 
the King's highway." — Corson. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE NEW WEST, I 848, I 849. 

Wisconsin was the fifth and last of the States 
carved out of the great "Northwest Territory" 
which lay north of the Ohio River and east of the 
Mississippi, — an area which had once belonged by 
charter to the thirteen original colonies. Its south- 
ern portion was largely settled by emigrants from 
New England and New York. Admitted to the 
Union in the year 1848, with a population of 250,- 
000 scattered over an area of fifty thousand square 
miles, with an eastern frontage washed for two 
hundred miles by the waters of Lake Michigan ; 
Lake Superior skirting its then almost unknown 
northern border ; and the Mississippi coursing along 
nearly 400 miles of its western boundary, with a 
most healthful climate and every variety of soil, 
from the fertile undulations of its southern prairies 
and oak openings to the pine forests of its northern 
parallels, and with rich and varied mineral stores 
within its borders, — the young State attracted the 
attention of the capitalist and the emigrant by its 
material resources, and of the philanthropist by the 
need of moulding influences on its plastic society. 
Its chief port, Milwaukee, occupying a beautiful site 

[73] 



74 MARY MORTIMER. 

on high bluffs overlooking Lake Michigan, even 
then gave promise of the lovely city it was to be- 
come, but its fifteen thousand inhabitants were still 
struggling for a foothold in their new home ; streets, 
public buildings, and private houses, were in process 
of construction, substantial docks and bridges were 
visions of the future, and the railroad facilities in 
prospect made a heavy draft on the resources of 
public-spirited citizens, when, in early September, 
1848, Miss Mortimer found herself a passenger by 
the great lakes for a visit to that young city and to 
her friend and former associate at Le Roy, Miss 
L. A. Seymour, now become Mrs. W. L. Parsons. 
The Rev. W. L. Parsons had been called to the 
pastorate of the Free Congregational Church then 
situated on Broadway, Milwaukee, and had begun 
his labors there a few weeks previous to Miss 
Mortimer's arrival. Mrs. Parsons, an experienced 
teacher, whose position at Le Roy Female Seminary 
Miss Mortimer had been called to supply two years 
before, felt deeply the need of better educational 
advantages for girls in the West. On the arrival 
of Mr. and Mrs. Parsons in Milwaukee ' ' but one 
third the youth of the city were enrolled in the 
public school," 1 and these were poorly housed and 
ill equipped. Within a month after the beginning 
of her husband's pastorate in Milwaukee, Mrs. 
Parsons issued, Aug. 18, 1848, a circular announc- 

1 Wight's " Annals of Milwaukee College" [2]. 



THE LIFE WORK. 75 



ing the opening of " Milwaukee Female Seminary " 
in the ensuing autumn. Its location was in a build- 
ing at the northwest corner of Milwaukee and 
Oneida streets, as a home for teachers and board- 
ing pupils, and the school-rooms were in a structure 
near Broadway which had been purchased, removed 
to the rear end of the Free Church lot, and fitted 
up for the purpose. Three teachers of experience 
Were engaged to assist Mrs. Parsons in the instruc- 
tion of the school, the plan of which was equal to 
that of the best Eastern schools for girls. 

Miss Mortimer's first letter from the West to Miss 
Thurston is dated — 

"Milwaukee, Wis., Thursday, Sept. 21, 1848. 
" . . . It is but a few weeks ago since I sat down in 
your room to write to L. A.; now, at a thousand miles' 
distance I sit down in hers to write to you. ... I felt 
a little tempted, even before I left the Empire State to 
wish that it had seemed best for me to go to you this 
fall, for I have had some reason to think I might have 
done your school more good now than at any future 
time; but the die seemed cast, and the Friday after I 
wrote, I proceeded to Brockport, and there the very 
same day arrived Mrs. G., bound for Chicago. We 
were both glad to have company of course ; concluded 
to remain there until the Friday following. . . . We 
reached Buffalo Saturday noon. ... I attended Dr. 
Lord's church on the Sabbath ; heard some fine ser- 
mons. Monday evening (Sept. 11) we took the 
steamer 'Niagara,' bound for Milwaukee and Chicago. 



76 MARY MORTIMER. 

Our sail around the lakes was rough and in almost every 
way unpleasant. We lay aground twenty-six hours in 
Lake St. Clair, and had almost constant clouds and 
strong head winds. Wednesday night and Thursday 
the wind blew quite a gale. The first night we were 
aground, and the wind did us no harm. The second it 
made me — oh ! so sick. I pray to be spared the sail- 
ing round these lakes again, unless it be in fine, calm 
weather. On Friday I thought I should never again 
want to go to England, and that I should not very soon 
be willing for you to be exposed to the same suffering 
for the sake of coming to see me. Saturday, just be- 
fore dark, we reached this city, and, after a long 
search, I found L. A. and her husband. . . . They 
are, I think, going to be very comfortably situated and 
to have a very flourishing school. They opened last 
Thursday and have now fifty scholars. 

". . . The West, as far as I have been able to gather, 
is in no such forlorn condition as we are sometimes led 
to believe, still, our good friends here seem to think 
that its wants are far greater than those of New York. 
Mr. P. has written in relation to schools, for me, to two 
towns on Fox River, 111. What the result of this, and 
any further investigations, may be, of course I cannot 
tell. . . . Since I left home, my foot feels its old 
symptoms coming on, and the fear of a full return of its 
ailments in this land of strangers is rather disheartening 
to me. If it gets much worse, I shall feel tempted to 
turn my face eastward at once, but I do not think it 
will if I am careful. Mr. P. and I have been discussing 
heresies, and my discussions have led me once more to 
be grateful for the lesson, long ago learned, to doubt 



THE LIFE WORK. 77 

my own reasoning, to receive mysteries on the word of 
the Highest." 

Soon, Miss Mortimer goes onward to Chicago, 
there to visit pupils and friends of former days, and 
then proceeds to carry out a long cherished desire 
to visit her brother Simeon in Michigan who, some 
years previous, had removed thither, there buried 
the wife of his youth and two of his children, and, 
after an interval in which his sister, Miss Martha 
Mortimer, had presided over his household, had 
recently installed a second wife, as mother to his 
remaining children. 

Lyons, Mich., Nov. 17, 1848. 

"I have strayed away into a little town in the forests 
of Michigan, — where my next tour will be I do not 
know. . . . Indications have pretty nearly decided 
me to remain somewhere in this Western land. I trust 
I have been and still am watching the indications of 
Providence and desiring to be led in the path of duty. 

"I remained in Milwaukee two and a half weeks, 
and then went, in company with Mr. P., who was going 
to a Convention of Ministers, to Southport [Kenosha], 
at which place I spent five days attending Convention 
and visiting Mr. and Mrs. M., formerly of Brockport. 
The meetings were very interesting — about sixty min- 
isters present. A very good spirit seemed to reign there, 
and I could but feel that they separated to kindle a 
flame of love in the churches of their charge. I heard 
one of the finest sermons there that I ever heard, — 
upon the wants of the age, or, rather, the quality of re- 
ligion demanded." 



78 MARY MORTIMER. 

" Thornapple, Mich., Nov. 21. 

" Alone, in a backwoods public house, I sit down to 
add a little to my epistle. . . . Saturday, letters 
reached me from Illinois which decided me to set off, 
even in this unpropitious season, for that place. But I 
will go back to where I left off. 

"From Southport I went to Chicago, where I spent 
two weeks in the family of J. H. C, one of the western 
liberals. My visit was very pleasant, very interest- 
ing, and, I trust, profitable. I heard a number of the 
Chicago ministers, visited two of the schools, rode all 
about the city and some miles out of it. I received a 
visit from Mr. and Mrs. J. (formerly Miss R. ) and 
Mrs. H., and visited them in return. . . . Mr. C. and 
his family urged me to abide in their city, said there 
was a fine building now vacant which the proprietor 
would let at a very low rate for a Female Seminary. 
The idea has some charms for me, but I felt that in 
various respects I was unfit for the undertaking, and I 
declined having any steps taken thereto. Something 
else, however, more to my liking, offered itself in reply 
to a letter written by Mr. P. to Ottawa. I should have 
proceeded there immediately had it not been that before 
I received word that seemed to me sufficiently encour- 
aging, I had written J. that I would go with him to 
Simeon's. . . . I accordingly left Chicago for Michigan, 
made a flying call, on my way, at Milwaukee, found 
L. A. and her family in a flourishing condition, and, 
for once on the Western lakes, had a delightful sail. 
Having crossed the lake we found a miserable steam- 
boat at the mouth of Grand River waiting to take us to 
Grand Rapids. The evening after I left there, I ar- 
rived, after a hard day's ride, at my brother's. My 



THE LIFE WORK. 79 

visit there was most gratifying, for his wife is, I think, 
the best step-mother that I ever saw. No words of 
ours, it seems to me, could eulogize her too strongly, 
always, of course, orthodoxly omitting, perfect. She is 
not beautiful nor graceful nor elegant nor brilliant, but 
she is intelligent and good, and O ! so patient and 
devoted to the interests and happiness of the children 
but a few months ago strangers to her. God bless her ! 
I trust I shall not soon lose the influence of her quiet, 
patient, loving spirit. 

" My brother and his family and the neighbors gener- 
ally, all urged that I should abide with them for the 
winter. They begged so hard that I could scarcely 
muster strength enough to say nay, but I did, feeling 
that I ought so to do, and yesterday set out on my way 
to Ottawa. My prospect there for the winter is to 
board in the family of the minister and teach a class, 
preparatory to opening a school in the spring, when, 
the minister informs me, there will be a building either 
to be sold or rented, suitable for my purpose. I like 
this plan better than commencing school at once, be- 
cause I want to see how things appear, and want the 
people to know me, before any permanent arrangements 
are made. ... If all turns out well, I expect then to 
send for Miss N. and open my school. I will only add, 
I think I never felt so much under the direction of 
Providence as since I left New York, — never felt more 
fully desirous to be guided by Him who is ' the Way, 
the Truth, and the Life.' 



"I will retain this, I think, until I reach Chicago, as 
you will receive it sooner, I presume, than from here, 



80 MARY MORTIMER. 

and then you will know of my fate after crossing the 
lake. My health is very good." 

" Niles, Friday, a. m. 
"I will delay my letter no longer. I reached this 
place through great tribulation Wednesday evening ; 
find myself here very pleasantly situated with kind, at- 
tentive friends ; was too tired when I reached here to go 
immediately on, and now am too late to reach Chicago 
before the Sabbath, so I suppose I shall remain until 
Monday." 

"Ottawa, Sat. evening, Jan. 6, 1849. 

"I left Niles the Tuesday after I wrote you, and had a 
rough sail across the lake in the last steamer that crossed. 
At Chicago I staid several days, hoping for better 
weather, but came at last in the awful — I cannot stay to 
describe my (December) stage ride, with a company of 
profane men, through mud and mire, water and storms, 
through streams, against logs, etc., etc. Suffice : 
we were forty-nine hours coming eighty miles, but 
not a hair of our heads was injured. My gentlemen 
company were very respectful, and I did not feel so 
badly as I anticipated when I left Chicago. . . . The 
morning after my arrival, Mr. B. appeared and greeted 
me very cordially. . . . He is quite intellectual, and, I 
think, the most independent minister that I ever knew, 
. . . amiable, energetic, most thoroughly awake to the 
corruptions of the church and the ministry, and withal, 
a very warm abolitionist, — too warm, too daring, to be 
popular with the mass. Mr. B. took me to his house 
and presented me to his wife, a very excellent lady, a 



THE LIFE WORK'. 81 

cousin of one of my Le Roy pupils. They have no 
children, and I find myself very pleasantly situated with 
them. They are very much interested in the matter of 
a Female Seminary, but I see not much else to warrant 
the undertaking. The place, however, is very pleasant, 
and a gentleman has offered to give two acres of land 
finely situated on the Fox river for a Seminary, but the 
money to build is wanting. . . . 

"I am now teaching a small class of young ladies, 
and myself studying Philosophy of History and Greek ! 
I should have thought it wiser to pursue my Latin, but 
I had not the books, and Mr. B. urged Greek. Be- 
sides this, I am reading all I can. Mr. B. has a valu- 
able library. My friends at Niles still urge me to go 
there. . . . 

"I have been writing some articles for the papers. 
. . . This brings to mind a subject which often weighs 
on my heart. I wish you could see it, and help me to 
decide on my future path. . . . Nothing in these days, 
I believe, gives me such a flow of spirits as health, and 
I have scarcely had such health for ten years as since I 
left New York. 



" You will give me your careful, earnest, prayerful 
attention, will you not, and tell me what you think. I, 
long ago, told you of my early dreams and aspirations 
for fame and honor. Your instructions, perhaps more 
than anything else, awoke me from those dreams ; but, 
convinced of the errors of my life, awakened to the 
truth as it is in Jesus, a desire deeper than for fame 
seized me to proclaim to others the truth and light which 

7 



82 MARY MORTIMER. 

I had found. That desire, modified somewhat, as my 
views have been changed or enlarged, still abides with 
me with all the freshness and fervency of youth. . . . 
I might long ago have believed myself called to write, 
for the idea, more or less deeply impressed upon me, 
has been before me almost ever since I can remember. 
It was the dream of my childhood, the ambitious as- 
piration of my youth, the vision most deeply of all 
impressed upon my riper years. No words can describe 
to you the yearning which sometimes comes over me to 
utter to others the truth which is thrilling my own heart. 
At the feet of Jesus it has been impressed upon me that 
I have a message to the world, that I must utter it. It 
seems to me that I have enthusiasm enough to suffer 
anything if I might be permitted to utter this message. 
... I have said something of all this to you before, 
but I have not told, I cannot tell you, how wildly my 
heart still beats, how it sympathizes with the loftiest 
flights of the great and good, how it throbs at the 
query, — Can I labor as they have labored? Vanity is 
not moving me, else would I shrink from uttering all 
this. I wish to reach the truth, to see my duty in re- 
gard to the truth. We ought to exert all the power that 
we have. ... I therefore inquire earnestly, Am I doing 
that for which I am best fitted, that by which I can 
accomplish most for the truth ? 

" Amid all the conflict of opinion and feeling within 
myself, the doubts, the hopes, the fears, you and other 
friends have urged me to write, have insisted that I 
could write. Will you now, my friend, tell me what all 
this, — what my not very bright prospects here, indi- 
cate? I left New York, as I said to you, with an inten- 



THE LIFE WORK. 83 

tion to return if I saw not a good prospect for useful- 
ness. The feeling in my own heart was that then . . . 
I would write, and thus test the long-pondered question. 
At Mr. P's. we talked over some of these things, and, 
very unexpectedly to me, he said an editorship was just 
the thing for me. He proposed at once taking some 
steps to bring it about, but I shrank from it, and that 
subject has now left me. I see my ignorance of a 
thousand things I need to know, my incoherent, inele- 
gant, unformed style of writing ; still it seems to me 
that now, after a fashion, I could edit a journal, and 
O if I could thus advance the cause of education, 
elevate woman, and lead some of the thousands of wan- 
derers from truth and righteousness to see and know 
from blessed experience that Jesus is the Way, the 
Truth, and the Life, I could then, as Simeon of old, in 
full honesty of heart, exclaim, "Now, Lord, lettest 
thou thy servant depart in peace ! " It seems to me there 
is a wide and noble field but poorly occupied by any of 
our journals, — it is that of education, in its noblest 
sense of woman's elevation, and of defending the truth 
of Christianity. ... I know full well I am not fitted 
for this great, this noble work, still I am deeply inter- 
ested in it, and capable, I almost dare to believe, with 
proper preparation, to do something thus. 

"I am not weary of teaching, I still love it as the 
apple of my eye. What shall I do ? Shall I labor to 
establish a school here ? Shall I return and try to 
write, and thus seek to relieve my heart of a burden 
which almost crushes it ? I would heed nothing but 
the voice of wisdom and duty in all this. If I can ut- 
ter nothing to benefit the world, God forbid that I 



84 MARY MORTIMER. 



should waste my time; that I should add to the heap 
of trash called literature. 

" It has seemed to me in my musings in this far-off 
land, that a school is a most fitting place for a publica- 
tion of the kind I am thinking of to emanate from, and 
that my reputation with some friends would make them 
interested in this enterprise. And now, my friend, I 
leave this matter. I have not told, as I said before, I 
cannot tell my thoughts and feelings. I wish I could, 
that you might the better advise me. I believe I have 
come to another crisis in my life. Whatever comes, I 
believe I can bow submissively if I can but see that I 
am doing my Heavenly Father's will, and I leave all to 
him with the prayer that he will make the path of 
duty plain before me ; that I may be wise to under- 
stand the leadings of Providence. ,, 

To M. E. H. (in regard to having spoken unfa- 
vorably of another.) 

" Ottawa, Jan., 1849. 

" I have said many things calculated to give you an 
unpleasant, painful impression of me. ... I love to 
study character, and in spite of knowing and feeling 
that I am full of faults, I am severe upon it. I know it 
is against me, and I feel impelled to make a confession 
to you for many un-Christian words I have uttered ; 
words which, though I believed them true, it was not 
necessary nor kind for me to say. Some things I per- 
haps should not have said had I not at first, under cir- 
cumstances peculiarly trying to me, broken the ice, at 
a time when pain and weakness of body rendered me 



THE LIFE WORK. 85 

weak in mind, too. But I will not try to cover a fault 
too glaring in my character to be hidden. May it 
teach you a lesson, which still it seems to me you 
scarcely need, and may I grow more humble, more 
faithful, more merciful. . . . 

"lam glad to learn that you are happy with Miss T., 
and she with you. She tells me she has some hope of 
retaining you, and that she expects Miss C. The thought 
of such a trio, so dear to me, and I almost a thousand 
miles from them would once have made my heart beat 
wildly, . . . but I am resigned, and can look forward 
hopefully to a field of labor far from them. I have 
never been able to comprehend the dark, sad view you 
take of life. I feel that it is not right, but more than 
this, I cannot understand why you have adopted it. 
Your general appearance is not sad, and with such hopes 
and aspirations as yours, why look thus upon life ? . . . 
I trust you have not had so much to darken your lot as 
I. An orphan's lot is but a sad one at the best, and 
mine has been far from the best. Disappointment has 
attended me in every cherished pursuit; the dearest, the 
best, have been snatched from my grasp. Still, I 
bless the Only Wise and Good that it is so. Save in my 
darker moments, I feel that life is a precious boon, that 
' it is good to be here ' even in this vale of tears. I see 
and feel that had it not been for my evil heart, I should 
not have experienced so many trials. That heart, more 
or less, has poisoned every cup of joy. Still is not 
this, the richest of all, left — Christ and his Truth? A 
world, dark to be sure, and full of evil, but in which 
there comes light so bright, so beautiful it dazzles the 



86 MARY MORTIMER. 

eyes to look upon it, — in which we may labor, and 
successfully too, to chase away darkness and evil. O ! 
I think I can never weary of life, nor cease to feel it 
the richest of blessings, so long as in it I may lead any 
wanderer to duty, and to God ; so long as I may con- 
tinue to catch glimpses of that truth of which Christ is 
the personification, so long as I may strengthen my 
power of vision, and obtain, day after day, and year 
after year, richer and fuller draughts of light, love and 
truth. Nor are we destitute of other blessings. False 
and hollow as is the world, there are warm, true hearts 
in it, and we may reach those hearts. Think you not, 
in my solitude this winter I look back to the time when 
some bright, loving faces were around me ? Some hearts 
which vibrated in sympathy with mine, and from which 
I drank inspiration in the hope of leading them still 
more deeply and fully to love the truth ? . . . I love to 
think of my last winter's twelve [the class of 1848 at Le 
Roy], and to commit them to Him who is able to keep 
them and to gather them and their teacher at his own 
right hand where there is fullness of joy. And we have 
nature, in her speaking beauty, upon which heart and 
inagination may revel, and science into whose mysteries 
and beauties we may search. Ah, believe me, my 
younger sister, it is blessed to live. We need not be 
blighted, nor disappointed, we need not doubt or fear, 
but hope and trust ever, and be satisfied and happy. So 
good is our Father. 

" Almost seven months have fled since I left my 
home and friends. For three months I have seen no 
one with whom I had any acquanitance before these 



THE LIFE WORK. 87 

three months began, still mercy has attended me. A 
stranger in a strange land, I have found kind friends 
and rich sources of improvement, and at length, ray 
path looks considerably plain and straight before me. 
. . . My kind Father has led one faithful heart to be 
willing to share my fortunes. With her I have a mod- 
erate, I trust a resigned, hope of happiness, of useful- 
ness. The future, in some sense, is all uncertain, in 
others, surer than the everlasting hills. God grant that 
in this gold-loving, truth-hating world we may do some- 
thing to bring about a better state of things. 

" For this winter, I have just closed eleven weeks of 
instruction to seven damsels, and now, I am waiting, — 
and I believe five or six of them, too, — somewhat anx- 
iously for the fourth of April. Besides teaching them, 
I have studied German some, and actually looked into 
a Greek grammar! ... I have studied History of 
Philosophy, and read Schiller's poems, and Shakespeare, 
and Carlyle. . . . All of which, or a part of which, has 
had a tendency to awaken my highest enthusiasm, and 
sometimes, therefore, when Schiller's glorious thoughts, 
or some one's else, are burning in my brain, I am, as of 
old, troubled to sleep. 

" I pant and thirst and yearn for the infinite, the in- 
describable ; my heart flutters, and the body seems a 
clog to the soaring spirit; then again joy, the sweetest, 
the brightest, comes. No truth, no imaginings are so 
glorious, so bright and beautiful as the religion of Jesus, 
and with the blessed conviction that this is mine, that 
He is forever mine, I sink in tears at his feet and am 
happy. 



MARY MORTIMER. 



" 1 hope for Miss N.'s presence soon after my school 
opens. I am pretty well, — not to boast of, or be proud 
of, however. 

" It is related of Herder that on his death-bed he ex- 
claimed : ' Give me a great thought that I may feast 
myself ! ' Let me give you one. You remember the 
grand Federation of the Champ-de-Mars, in the history 
of the French Revolution. Carlyle says of it, ' O ! 
Champ-de-Mars Federation with three hundred drum- 
mers, twelve hundred wind musicians, and artillery 
planted on height after height to boom the tidings of it 
all over France in few minutes ! Could no atheist con- 
ceive to discern, eighteen centuries off, those thirteen 
most poor, mean-dressed men at frugal supper in a 
mean Jewish dwelling, with no symbol but hearts God- 
initiated into the divine depths of sorrow, and a "Do 
this in remembrance of me," — and so cease that 
small, difficult crowing of his, if he were not doomed 
to it?' 

"What a closing this of that vivid description of that 
scene ! What a contrast the few words set before me ! 

"A thought or two from Schiller and I have done: — 

"Alas, the Truth may light bestow, 

Not always warmth the beams impart, 

Blessed be he who gains the boon to know, 
Nor buys the Knowledge with the heart. 

For warmth and light a blessing both to be, 

Feel as the enthusiast, — as the world- wise, see." 

To Miss T. : — 

"Ottawa, Sabbath, March. 18, 1849. 
"The Fox river flowing into the Illinois, beautifully 
tinged by the last rays of the setting sun, lies spread out 



THE LIFE WORK. 80 



before me, but the friends I love dwell not toward the 
golden West. The King of day has already left them, 
and as they gaze upon the still glowing West, perhaps 
some of them are reminded of the wanderer, and offer 
one petition that she may be sheltered under the wings 
of Almighty love. The thought is touchingly sweet to feel 
that those we love are offering the prayer of faith for 
us; that the influence of these prayers, richer than 'the 
dew of Hermon' shall descend upon us. I believe I 
feel such influence ; my heart has burned within me as 
I have besought a blessing on the absent ones. ... It 
is the richest privilege we can conceive. 

"I have mingled somewhat with the slandered aboli- 
tionists, — thank God that I am happy to be counted 
among them. I grow more interested in the subject, 
more satisfied that the church is corrupt on this great 
question, that our benevolent societies, ecclesiastical 
bodies, are tainted with the sin of loving the praise of 
men rather than the praise of God. My spirit is, if 
possible, more stirred within me as I think of the 
'wolves in sheep's clothing' who seek to fasten on 
God's blessed book the foul crime of upholding slavery. 
I had a conversation the other evening with a good 
Wesleyan upon Hebrew slavery, or rather servitude. 
O how much more becoming the professed ministers 
of Christ to vindicate God's book from the darkest 
crime which could be laid to its charge, at the expense 
of wicked men, than to vindicate them at the expense 
of it, and of the salvation of thousands who will perish 
through this foul lie ! Dear Miss T., who taught me to 
love Him who < has made of one blood all nations of 



90 MARY MORTIMER. 

the earth/ I laid me down that night with an ach- 
ing heart and a throbbing brow, yet my heart burned 
with gratitude, for my heavenly Father, by the mouth 
of his servant had cleared away all clouds from His 
word on this subject. But I thought of you, of other 
loved friends, whose hearts are more full of love, of 
kindness than mine, yet who are, to some extent, 
blinded on this subject. I thought of the thousands in 
the Christian Church who are holding slaves, trampling 
their Maker's image in the dust, breaking even sacred 
obligation, and, worse than all, attempting to justify 
themselves by the word of the Holy One ; of the thou- 
sands of others, who directly or indirectly, are uphold- 
ing them ; and my tears flowed fast. My friend, 
believe you that the Bible teaches anything about 
slavery but opposition to it? 

" Let me tell you a tale from the Wesleyan. He said 
he once preached upon Hebrew servitude. After the 
sermon, he fell into conversation with an apparently 
very intelligent and conscientious man, of whom he 
asked, among other questions, his views of the Bible. 
The man replied that he had been skeptical and the 
defense of slavery from the Bible had made him so. 
Our learned divines, he said, defended slavery ; they 
had long and carefully studied the Bible, — their opin- 
ions were certainly of weight ; he had yielded to them, 
and therefore doubted the Bible. He knew what slavery 
was, had been among it, and while he remembered 
one scene, a poor slave, only on suspicion stretched to 
the utmost tension of his bones and muscles, whipped 
till his flesh was a pumice, and then burning wax in seven 
places poured upon him and allowed to burn there, — 
while he remembered this, he should know that a book 



THE LIFE WORK. 91 

defending such a system never came from a righteous 
God. But I must not dwell upon the theme. My head 
has ached ever since my conversation with the Wesleyan, 
and I am increasing the pain. May God hasten the 
day when the veil shall be rent from all eyes, when 
God's best gift to man shall be seen in its own un- 
clouded glory and excellence." 

The great educational needs of the West could 
not be met by private and unendowed schools, 
although some of these were of the greatest service, 
especially before larger enterprises appealing to a 
wider constituency were founded. Miss Mortimer's 
unique personality, indomitable perseverance, and 
remarkable gifts and attainments were needed 
in the widest sphere. Yet such was her love of 
independence, and her originality in methods of 
education, that an experiment in a school of her 
own, whose ideals she should dominate, was an 
essential part of her preparation for the larger work 
which awaited her. This experiment she now 
made in Ottawa, 111. As shown by her correspond- 
ence, she had spent the winter teaching a class of 
a few young ladies, and studying the field and the 
mutual adaptions of herself and the people. Not 
without some misgivings as to the outlook in the 
young community for the building up of such a 
school as she desired, but on the whole, coura- 
geously and cheerfully, she prepared to open her 
school in the spring of 1 849. Her circular announc- 
ing this fact bears date — 



92 MARY MORTIMER. 

" Feb. 16, 1849. 

"Misses Mary Mortimer and M. J. Newcombe pro- 
pose to open an Academy for the instruction of young 
ladies in Ottawa, La Salle Co., Illinois. 

"The object of this school will be : First, carefully 
and thoroughly to teach the sciences, not wholly, nor 
even mainly, as an end, but as a means through which 
to arrive at Truth, physical, intellectual and moral ; 
Second, by the aid of this Truth and the mental ex- 
ercise required to reach it, to assist in the formation and 
development of character, — such character as woman 
needs to fit her for her high and responsible duties. 
In accordance with these objects, the teachers of this 
school will aim to exercise the judgment rather than 
the memory, the reason rather than the imagination; to 
teach the principles of science rather than its details ; 
science itself rather than books. 

" Misses M. and N. believe that woman is capable 
of the highest mental culture, and that the arguments 
brought against her studying the abstruser sciences — 
viz., her volatility and want of power — only prove her 
need of such study. Therefore, while they will not 
aim to discard or neglect the ornamental branches of a 
refined education, they will esteem them of secondary 
importance compared with those which are universally 
admitted to be better calculated to develop the power 
of thought and to form noble and useful character. . . . 

" They design to establish a permanent school, which, 
without being the representative of any sect or party, 
without aiming to teach the peculiar tenets of any, shall 
yet make Christianity the light and life of its instruc- 
tions. ..." 



THE LIFE WORK. 93 

The school was announced to open April 4, 1 849, 
and among the names to whom intending patrons 
were referred for reference, were those of the 
Principals of Geneva, Elmira, and Le Roy Female 
Seminaries, of a number of professional gentlemen 
in Brockport, Geneva, Rochester, and Buffalo, of 
Horace Webster, LL. D. , Principal of Free Acad- 
emy, New York City, and of several friends in the 
West, including the Rev. W. L. Parsons of Mil- 
waukee and Mrs. Dr. Bradley (her former associate 
in Geneva and Brockport), then of Byron, 111. 

Her associate, Miss Newcombe, had been (as a 
member of the class of 1847) one °f ner favorite 
pupils in Le Roy, and could enter into the spirit of 
her teaching and share her ideals as no one could 
who had not enjoyed the privilege of her instruc- 
tion. In reply to inquiry regarding the Ottawa 
period of Miss Mortimer's life, Miss Newcombe, 
later Mrs. John Mortimer, writes : — 

"You ask for some particulars of the Ottawa life. 
She went there with the idea of establishing a school of 
her own. She had been in early youth, as you know, 
profoundly skeptical in respect to Christianity, and as 
her views cleared and settled, she longed to go West. 
There was more latent infidelity, she thought, than was 
generally known or dreamed of, especially in the West, 
and she desired to go there and teach in her own way, 
free and untrammeled, the new-found truth which 
burned within her. She took, at that time, also the 
deepest interest in Southern slavery, and wished to be 



94 MARY MORTIMER. 

free to speak and work against it. I have heard her 
often, at Le Roy and at Ottawa, combating it in the 
presence of its advocates, with indignant denunciation 
and the most consummate and conclusive arguments. 

"1 will only add that in all my life I have never 
known so unique, so tender, yet so strong and grand a 
character as hers." 

Miss Mortimer wrote Miss Thurston : — 

"March 20, 1849. 

"For the present, as you will have learned ere this, 
the matter is decided, and I have enough, more than 
enough to do, to build up a school on a soil not very 
promising. I am thankful that light sufficient was 
afforded me for a decision, and since then I grow more 
and more confirmed that it was right, — though faint 
doubt comes sometimes. . . . 

" I am glad is going to you. . . . Beautiful, 

sensitive and unselfish as she is, I fear, much as we have 
prized and loved her, we have never fully appreciated 
her. Sure I am, I never met such a combination of 
beauty, simplicity and guilelessness with such strength 
and such keen, refined and lofty sensibility. . . . God 
bless you both and make you rich blessings to each 
other, to all around you. It is not without emotion 
that, almost a thousand miles from you, I think of the 
union of the two whom I have believed myself to love 
so deeply, but believe me, I rejoice in it. I am willing, 
weak as the flesh is at the thought, to be forgotten, if 
thus I might conduce to the happiness of either, but I 
have no fear of this. You have both proved yourselves 



THE LIFE WORK. 95 

. . . too true and faithful to forget, to cease to love 
and yield to me the kindest offerings of friendship. I 
shall think of you in my far-away home, and pray that 
upon you may descend Heaven's richest, brightest 
blessings. 

"I commence school in two weeks. As to prospects 
. . . Mr. B. is sanguine, but he is a sanguine man. 
Thus far I feel very happy in the prospect. The best 
school-building in the town was very unexpectedly of- 
fered me, and the furniture, on moderate terms. . . . 
Mr. B. has engaged a large brick house, where he con- 
sents to board us and any young ladies who may offer 
themselves. . . . This I feel is a very fortunate ar- 
rangement, and I shall commence hopefully, trustfully. 
My friends are so kind and good, — I have no words to 
express my gratitude. . . . How many mercies I have 
to rejoice over! . . . Tell me if you like my circular. 
. . . L. A. (Mrs. Parsons at Milwaukee Seminary) is 
progressing finely. She has twice written me to join 
her. She had more than eighty scholars at her last re- 
port to me. Bro. W. has given me up. ... I cannot 
yield myself a proselyte of Oberlinism, — still, Miss T., 
there is good in Oberlin." 

" Ottawa, June 9, 1849. 
"I can but hope that with two such reliable helpers 
as F. and Miss H., you will relieve yourself a little, 
but I do n't know. The day never was yet when you 
did not see it necessary to perform an amount of labor 
which I should sink under. For my part, I do not see 
what keeps you up. Sure I am 'tis a blessed thing that 
you have not such a tumultuous boiling nature as I 
have, or you could not endure the labor you do. I 



96 MARY MORTIMER. 

cannot judge much as to whether you have good 
ground for the apprehension of which you spoke in 
your last. . . . What is the need of fearing ? We are 
laboring, I trust, in our Master's vineyard, and for 
Him. He will take care of us and our interests. I do 
for myself realize this, and am grateful to you more 
than to any other earthly friend for the doctrine. 
Headstrong, willful as I am and have been, the Geneva 
Female Seminary did very much toward moulding and 
fashioning my character as a teacher. Surely the 
stamp of it is upon me, and, in my way, I am dissemi- 
nating the lessons of what I am still happy and proud 
to consider my Alma Mater. 

"Let us fear nothing. Clouds and darkness are 
around me when I look earthward, but I am permitted 
a little to penetrate beyond, and all is bright and peace- 
ful. One question trembles in my deepest heart some- 
times, when oppressed with pain and weakness I have 
to yield all efforts. Why so many, such burning as- 
pirations in my heart, and I ever denied their gratifica- 
tion ? 

"I received a letter from M. A. yesterday. It con- 
tained no news ; only a plan for me to go and visit her 
this week, which I think I cannot do. Miss N. is 
nearly ill, and I dare not leave her. There is some 
sickness in our town and our school has diminished of 
late. We close our first quarter and commence an- 
other next week. To the strong and courageous, I 
think prospects are encouraging. Our school is inter- 
ested and good and happy. We do not have reports, 
and I am growing to believe that it is better so. Almost 



THE LIFE WORK. 97 

no communications, nor indolence, are among us. I 
really find it pleasant to govern a school, and feel very 
happy amid the happy faces of my pupils. I shall be 
glad to abide with them. 

" The cholera is about, in most of the river towns, 
but it can scarcely be said to have reached us. One or 
two cases have been reported here, but they were of 
persons just come up from down the river. 

" Where do you room, dear Miss T.? Whom do you 
have with you, and whom does Miss H. have with her? 
Do you take any walks ? How are your children ? 
Do they remember me, and my visit of last sum- 
mer? Do you know anything of the Genevans? 

" I have just been reading over your letter. I think, 
after all the doubts and darkness, you will come off tri- 
umphant. Read Carlyle, and he will show you, in 
burning characters on your heart, that mean people 
cannot triumph, that honesty and truth alone can suc- 
ceed. 

"I am becoming notorious I fear. One of the 

editors has a great liking for dragging us poor ladies 
into the papers. I am figuring, — very flatteringly, to 
be sure, — once more this week. 

"O dear ! what a shallow world this is." 

Ere long that insidious foe, cholera, took posses- 
sion of Ottawa, as it had done of towns below at 
the date of the foregoing letter. Miss Mortimer 
knew not what fear was, and when, in some sec- 
tions of the village, almost every house contained 
the dead or dying, she addressed herself with hero- 
8 



98 MARY MORTIMER. 

ism to the help of the suffering. But her own 
health was too uncertain to bear the strain, and 
soon she herself entered the penumbra of that aw- 
ful shadow. Rallying, by the advice and entreaty 
of friends, she left the town, as the event proved, 
no more to reside there. Already, a factor, hith- 
erto unseen, had entered into the forces which were 
shaping her life-work. 



CHAPTER II. 

CATHERINE BEECHER EDUCATION. 

Catherine Beecher, eldest child of Rev. Lyman 
Beecher, was born in her father's parish at East- 
hampton, L. L, in the year 1800. Her mother, 
Roxana Foote Beecher, was a woman who in a 
remarkable degree, combined rare culture, strength 
of character, and sweetness of disposition. Some 
of her letters to Mr. Beecher, written before their 
marriage, are masterpieces of theological discrimi- 
nation, and later in life he was heard to say that 
his wife was the most potent opponent in argument 
whom he had ever met. 

The young Easthampton pastor and his wife be- 
gan life together in their Long Island parish on a 
limited salary, and Mrs. Beecher, notwithstanding 
the cares of a young family of her own, ' ' opened 
a family school, receiving a select number of 
young ladies to study under her direction and 
that of her sister, a lady of great beauty, elegance 
and refinement." Thus the child Catherine, before 
she was sent to any school, was surrounded in her 
home by an atmosphere at once womanly, elevated, 
stimulating, refining. When she was about ten 
years old, her father removed to Litchfield, Conn., 

[99] 



100 MARY MORTIMER. 

a town already famous through its Law School, 
which numbered eminent men among the profes- 
sors, and youth from every part of the country 
among its students. Perhaps not less pervasive 
and abiding was the influence of Litchfield through 
its Female Seminary, a school at that time without 
a peer. It was under the charge of Mrs. Sarah 
Pearse, a well-educated and superior woman, " but 
its real head and guide " says Rose Terry Cooke, 
herself afterward a pupil of Mr. Brace, ' ' was a 
nephew of the Principal, Mr. John Pearse Brace, a 
teacher still held in grateful remembrance. No 
teacher can ever have educated his pupils in the 
true sense better than Mr. Brace ; less of a martinet 
and drill-master than the modern schoolmaster, he 
understood by some subtle intelligence the way to 
influence every mind in contact with his own ; he 
knew what we were and what we needed with in- 
fallible instinct, and made study a keen delight 
when he taught, whatever was the subject. Under 
the name of Jonathan Rossiter, Mrs. Stowe has 
described him in the latter part of ' Oldtown Folks ' 
with a vigor and detail that point him to the life." 

Mrs. Stowe wrote of him in a letter to her 
brother : ' ' Mr. Brace was one of the most stimulat- 
ing and inspiring instructors I ever knew." In this 
school and under these teachers, Catherine Beecher 
received her education. 

Says her sister, Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe : — 



THE LIFE WORK. 101 

" She was vigorous, energetic, and possessed of a 
decided talent for music, painting and versification. 
Her poems, published while she was still under twenty, 
in the Christian Spectator, drew the attention of the 
noble and gifted Prof. Fisher of Yale College, and they 
became engaged, with the highest prospect of earthly 
happiness. Prof. Fisher, soon after, was lost with the 
vessel on which he sailed for Europe, and his young 
fiancee was plunged in the deepest agony, aggravated 
by the preaching of Dr. Emmons, whose service she at- 
tended while on a visit to Prof. Fisher's family. 

"Miss Beecher kept up a vigorous correspondence 
with her father, in which the prevailing current of New 
England theology was discussed from every point of 
view. At last she came to the conclusion to let these 
insoluble problems alone, and devote herself to the 
simple following of Jesus Christ in a life of practical 
usefulness. She came back to Litchfield, united with 
her father's church, and selected the field of education 
as the one to which she would hereafter devote her 
energies." 

The foundations of New England education were 
laid by educated men, within thirty years after its 
settlement. There never was a time when educated 
and refined women were not found in some New 
England families of superior culture and means. 
But this was not the rule. The town histories 
show that in the eighteenth and the early part of 
the nineteenth century, education had fallen into a 
low state, particularly during the revolutionary war 



1 02 MAR Y MOR TIMER. 

and the hardships attendant upon the pioneer settle- 
ment of the country. 1 

But the moral soil of the original colonies was 
underlaid by rock on which the percolating waters, 
slowly, through storm and stress, were gathering 
energy to spring up under more favoring condi- 
tions in many an overflowing spring of blessing, at 
about the same time, and in widely sundered com- 
munities. 

The need of education, especially for girls, was 
very great. The law, it is true, made obligatory 
the maintenance of schools " for children " in every 
community of a given number of families. But the 
popular, practical interpretation of the law ordi- 
narily recognized only boys as 'scholars in the public 
schools. Girls were taught at home, or in private 
" dame's schools" to read and sew, and to know 
their Bible and Catechism. "Some girls learned 
to write, but postoffices were few, and women 
commonly had little need of the pen." It is said 
that at the close of the Revolutionary War, there 
were women of high social position in Boston who 
could not read. An aged woman in Hatfield, Mass. , 
used to relate that when a girl, she was in the habit 
of going to the school-house and sitting on the door- 
step that she might listen to the recitations of the 
boys in a building whose threshold no girl might 
cross as a pupil. 

1 See " History of Higher Education for Women in Massachusetts," 
Bulletin of U. S. Bureau of Education. 



THE LIFE WORK. 103 

In 1780, Thomas Jefferson laid the foundation of 
public education in all grades, in the State of 
Virginia, 1 and the common schools were opened to 
both sexes. After the close of the Revolutionary 
War, changed conditions in the labor-market threw 
open new and more remunerative employment for 
young men, and women began to be employed as 
teachers. Only "masters," however, were recog- 
nized by law as teachers in the public schools. If 
a woman ventured to teach, her payment was a 
voluntary matter with the town officers, as she had 
no legal right to collect her wages. 

In 1790, Boston began to admit girls to its public 
schools, but only in the summer-time, when there 
were not boys enough to fill them. This lasted 
until 1822. 2 With the increasing number of women- 
teachers, girls began to be admitted to the schools 
in other parts of the country. In 1792, a Massa- 
chusetts town was indicted for voting "not to be 
at any expense for schooling girls," and forced to 
admit them in the summer-time. In Bristol, R. I., 
girls did not attend the public schools until 1828. 

"From the time when reading, morals and manners 
were required to be taught in the public schools, 'with 
writing if contracted for/ there was constant improve- 
ment in the curriculum. The study of Arithmetic, 
Geography and Orthography became common, and 
other reading-books took the place of the New England 
Primer. At first, Arithmetic and Geography were taught 

1 Boutell's "Thomas Jefferson, the Man of Letters." 

2 Vide "Quincy's Municipal History of Boston." 



104 MARY MORTIMER. 

only in the winter, as a knowledge of these branches 
was deemed superfluous for girls. When Colburn's 
Mental Arithmetic was introduced, girls were not ex- 
pected to study it. But they persevered, and were not 
far behind their brothers in reaching the mathematical 
goal of the times — the Rule of Three." 1 

As the demand for women-teachers came, they 
felt a need of higher schools where women might 
be educated and teachers might be fitted for their 
work. Several academies founded late in the eight- 
eenth century admitted girls. In 1803 the academy 
at Bradford, Mass., was opened, at first for both 
sexes. Before this, in the spring of 1 800, a Ver- 
mont frontier community, having been permanently 
settled but little more than ten years, had begun 
a Female Seminary which was an offshoot from 
that of Litchfield, Connecticut. One of the public- 
spirited citizens of this young community, at Mid- 
dlebury, Vermont, was the Hon. Horatio Seymour, 
formerly of Litchfield, Conn. He took an active in- 
terest in establishing a school of high grade for the 
daughters of the pioneers, and deeded land as a site 
for the needed building. He was acquainted in 
Litchfield with a young lady who had been educated 
in Mrs. Pearse's already celebrated school, and was 
empowered by the citizens of Middlebury ' ' to invite 
her to establish a similar school there. " The school 
thus established by Miss Ida Strong at Middlebury 
in 1 800, ' ' soon rose to such reputation as to attract 

1 Vide " Introduction to History of Mt. Holyoke Female Seminary." 



THE LIFE WORK. 105 

pupils from nearly all parts of the State. In the 
winter of 1802-3 the citizens formed an association 
in aid of the school, and in the summer of 1803, 
the requisite stock was raised, and a building for the 
use of the school erected. " It is worthy of note," 
says Mrs. Emma Willard, ' ' that this Academy was 
one of the very first in the country which was built 
for that special object" — the education of girls. 
The nearest, if not the only school of reputation, to 
which Vermont girls could resort, before the found- 
ing of this school, was Mrs. Pearse's school at 
Litchfield. 

The school so auspiciously begun in a region 
almost a wilderness was not only among the earliest, 
but it was, in an important sense, the link between 
the Litchfield school and that which afterward at- 
tained so wide a fame under Mrs. Emma Willard at 
Troy, N. Y. Miss Strong kept her school in 
Middlebury in successful operation until her health 
failed. She died in the autumn of 1804, having 
evinced by her success that ' ' she was a woman of 
no common talents, education and energy. " 1 The 
school languished until the summer of 1807, when 
a young but successful teacher, also from Connecti- 
cut, Miss Emma Hart, afterward Mrs. Willard, 
was invited to take charge of it, and accepted the 
invitation. She wrote: "The winter of 1807-8 
was one of exceeding hardship for me. Though 
very cold, with frequent storms and much snow, I 

1 Swift's "History of Middlebury, Vermont." 



106 MARY MORTIMER. 

had to walk from Dr. T. 's, where I boarded, to the 
Academy, and when there, to keep my school in a 
large, long room, formed like an ordinary ball- 
room, occupying the whole upper story, while the 
only means of gaining warmth was from an open 
fire in a small fire-place at the north end. . . . 
When it was so cold that we could live no longer, I 
called all my girls on to the floor and arranged 
them, two and two, in a long row for a contra- 
dance ; and while those who could sing would strike 
up some stirring tune, I, with one of the girls for 
a partner, would lead down the dance and soon 
have them all in rapid motion." When sufficiently 
warmed in this way, the pupils would return to their 
studies. 

At the end of two years' conduct of the school, 
which gained high and increasing reputation, Miss 
Hart married Dr. John Willard, an eminent phy- 
sician and politician of Middlebury. After a few 
years the financial crisis accompanying the war of 
1812 swept away Dr. Willard's fortune, and Mrs. 
Willard, in 1814, opened in her own elegant home, 
another school for young ladies, which she main- 
tained in Middlebury for several years, drawing to 
it patrons from all parts of the State and from 
New York. Through the parents of some of her 
pupils in the latter State, her school, for which, 
with great study and indefatigable perseverance she 
had matured large plans, was brought to the notice 
of Gov. DeWitt Clinton. Through his influence, 



THE LIFE WORK. 107 

and with the hope held out of State aid, which was 
not however fully realized, Mrs. Willard, with the 
co-operation of her husband, removed her school 
to New York, where ii was finally located at Troy 
in the year 1821. Here Mrs. Willard, with wise 
benevolence, betook herself to the training of 
teachers, and sent forth to different States, two 
hundred teachers before one was educated in any 
public normal school in the United States. 

" It was in Middlebury," says Mrs. Willard " that 
the stream of lady-mathematicians took its rise, 
which afterward went out from Troy Seminary to 
every part of the Union." It is related that while 
in Middlebury, Mrs. Willard introduced the study of 
Physiology, but so great was the innovation that at 
the examination, the entire audience, shocked at 
the indelicacy of teaching such a subject to girls, 
rose and left the room. The first examination of a 
young lady in Geometry was by Mrs. Willard in 
Waterford, N. Y. , and called forth a storm of 
ridicule. 

These years from 18 10 were also those in which 
Catherine Beecher was studying at the Litchfield 
school, which was the original fountain whence the 
healing streams of Middlebury and Troy Seminaries 
had flowed. 

Massachusetts meantime had not been idle. In 
a small community in the north-eastern corner 
of the State, the Rev. Joseph Emerson was pon- 
dering deeply the need of woman's education. In 



108 MARY MORTIMER. 

the very year when Mrs. Willard opened the school 
in her Middlebury residence — 1814 — Mary Lyon 
was teaching her first school in Buckland at ' ' sev- 
enty-five cents per week and boarded round." 

In the years 1818-24, Rev. Joseph Emerson 1 
drew to his school in Byfield, Mass. , many young 
women of earnest purposes and strong desires for 
improvement. Among them were Misses Z. P. 
Grant and Mary Lyon. Mr. Emerson's views and 
plans on the subject were largely in advance of his 
times, but they took root in the hearts of some of 
his pupils and bore abundant fruit. He said to 
Miss Grant : — 

"If you can put into operation a permanent school 
on right principles, you can well afford to give up your 
life whenever you have done it." 

' ' The germ of the Seminary founded by Miss 
Lyon" [1837] savs Pres. Hitchcock in his memoir 
of that lady, ' ' may probably be found in this re- 
mark." 

In 1823 the Adams Female Academy was en- 
dowed at Londonderry, N. H. It was the first 
incorporated school of its kind in New England in 
which the course of studies was prescribed, the 
classes arranged as in our Collegiate institutions, 
and diplomas given. It was at this place that Miss 
Grant and Miss Lyon originally adopted the plan 

1 " Life of Rev. Joseph Emerson." 



THE LIFE IV OR A'. 109 

afterward carried out by them at Ipswich and 
South Hadley. 1 

A course of study especially designed for young 
women was provided at the founding of Oberlin 
College in 1833. Both the first and the second 
principal of that department were pupils of the Rev. 
Joseph Emerson and Miss Grant. Thus the stream 
of influence which has flowed over America and the 
world through the women of Mt. Holyoke and 
Oberlin, took its rise in a small community of 
Massachusetts in the closing years of the first quar- 
ter of this century. 

Meantime Miss Beecher was carrying out, at 
Hartford, Conn. , her own scheme of education for 
girls. In the "History of Hartford" it is stated 
that early in 1823, Miss C. E. Beecher of Litch- 
field, with her sister Mary [afterward Mrs. Perkins], 
opened a school for young ladies in a small room 
over a store on Asylum St. , with an attendance of 
seven pupils. In the autumn of the same year it 
was announced in the Hartford C our ant that 
"Misses C. and M. Beecher will commence their 
winter term November 20. No scholar under twelve 
years of age need apply, and none will be received 
for less than one quarter. " " Attendance rapidly in- 
creased from seven to one hundred. The principal 
soon saw the necessity of better equipments. By 
persistent appeals to the mothers of her pupils, she 

1 "History of Londonderry, N. H." p. 120. 



HO MARY MORTIMER. 

succeeded in bringing fifty public-spirited citizens 
of the town into an organization for the erection 
and equipment of such a building as she wished. " 
This was in 1827, ten years before the erection of 
Mt. Holyoke Seminary. With no knowledge of 
what Mrs. Willard was doing at Troy, and Misses 
Grant and Lyon at Ipswich, ' ' Miss Beecher strove 
to realize her ideal of education, and until her health 
broke down, she maintained an institution not infe- 
rior to any in the country, which became the model 
for many others, and attained the highest reputation. " 

The edifice of the " Hartford Female Seminary" 
was opened by an address on education by the 
Rev. T. H. Gallaudet. Miss Beecher's own views 
of education were embodied in a paper printed in a 
pamphlet in 1829, entitled, "Suggestions Respect- 
ing Improvements in Education, Presented to the 
Trustees of Hartford Female Seminary," which had 
an extended circulation and a wide influence. 

The new building contained a hall to accommo- 
date one hundred and fifty students, for study and 
general exercises, six recitation rooms and a room 
for chemical laboratory and lectures. 

"In her 'Suggestions on Education' [writes Mrs. 
Stowe] Miss Beecher forcibly compared the provis- 
ion that had hitherto been made for the education of 
men with those which had been deemed sufficient for 
the other sex. For the brothers of a family, the well- 
endowed college with its corps of professors, each 



THE LIFE WORK. Ill 

devoted to one department of knowledge, and with 
leisure to teach it in the most complete manner; — for 
the sisters of the family only such advantages as they 
could get from one teacher in one room, who had the 
care of teaching in all branches ; and she asked what 
but superficial knowledge could be the result of such a 
system. The article was vigorously written, and excited 
much attention. It was favorably noticed in the North 
American and in the Revue Encyclopedique, and drew 
instant attention to the system that was being carried on 
in the Hartford Female Seminary. 

" Surrounded by young life, enthusiastic in study 
and teaching, Miss Beecher recovered the buoyant 
cheerfulness which had always characterized her. . . . 
She had under her care some of the brightest and most 
receptive minds, and the results, as shown in the yearly 
exhibitions to which parents and friends were invited, 
were quite exciting. Latin and English compositions, 
versified translations from Vergil and Ovid, astonished 
those who had not been in the habit of expecting such 
things in a ' female school. ' 

"Miss Beecher succeeded in imparting her enthu- 
siasm both to her teachers and scholars, and there was 
scarce a week in which the school was not visited by 
strangers desirous to observe its methods." 

Her system (see "History of Hartford") was 
carried out by her assistants in similar institutions 
in different parts of the country, notably in New 
Haven, Conn., Huntsville, Ala., Springfield, Mass., 
and Philadelphia, Pa. 



1 1 2 MAR Y MOR TIMER. 

"The efficiency and energy" [continues Mrs. Stowe] 
that Miss Beecher displayed at this period of her 
career was the wonder of every one who knew her. 
With all the cares of between one and two hundred 
pupils, many from distant States of the Union, Miss 
Beecher's influence was felt everywhere, regulating the 
minutest details. She planned the course of study, 
guided and inspired the teachers, overlooked the dif- 
ferent boarding houses, corresponded with parents and 
guardians. She prepared an Arithmetic and a Mental 
and Moral Philosophy, and printed them for the use of 
her school. She constantly enforced upon her teachers 
that education was not merely the communication of 
knowledge, but the formation of character. Each 
teacher had committed to her care a certain number of 
scholars whose character she was to study, whose af- 
fection she was to seek, and whom she was to strive, 
by all means in her power, to lead to moral and relig- 
ious excellence. The first hour of every morning was 
given to a general religious exercise with the school, 
and the results of these exercises, and of the whole system 
of influences was such that multitudes can look back to 
the Hartford Female Seminary as the place where they 
received influences that shaped their whole life for this 
world and the world to come. 

" She kept up systematic exercise on horseback, the 
practice of music as a recreation, furnished an oc- 
casional poem for the Connecticut Observer, and re- 
ceived on one evening of each week, her own friends 
and those of her pupils to a social gathering enlivened 
by music and conversation. The weekly levees of the 



THE LIFE WORK. 113 

Hartford Female Seminary were a great addition to the 
social life of Hartford. 

"For some years it seemed as if there was no limit 
to what she could plan and accomplish. As the making 
money was no part of her object in teaching, so every 
improvement which money could procure was added to 
the many advantages of the Seminary. A lecturer on 
history was employed who introduced charts of ancient 
and modern history; afterwards used as the basis of in- 
struction. A lady who first brought into use the system 
of Calisthenics gave a course in the Seminary, and thus 
the exercises became a daily part of the school duties. 
Dr. Barbour, afterwards Professor of Elocution in 
Harvard College, was hired to give a course of instruc- 
tion in his department, and his book was introduced 
into the school. So many were the teachers employed, 
so many the advantages secured to the pupils, that Miss 
Beecher, at the head of it all, made no more than a com- 
fortable support, and laid up nothing for the future." 

After a number of years, Miss Beecher's health 
failed, and she relinquished the school to her old 
Litchfield teacher, Mr. John P. Brace. When her 
father removed to Cincinnati in 1832, Miss Beecher 
went with him, and, assisted by her sister Harriet, 
commenced a school for girls in that place. But 
henceforth, Miss Beecher left her place in the 
schools to be filled by others, while she addressed 
herself to the larger task of inspiring and directing 
the course of education over wider areas. 

9 



114 MARY MORTIMER. 

4 'She formed a league " says Mrs. Stowe, "for 
supplying the West with educated teachers." 
About 1846, ex-Governor Slade of Vermont was 
employed as Corresponding Secretary and General 
Agent of the "Board of National Popular Educa- 
tion " (the league referred to). Mrs. Stowe says, 
" Gov. Slade of Vermont, as agent for this Asso- 
ciation, traveled and lectured, and as the result, 
many teachers were sent West, and many schools 
founded. It was planned to erect one leading Semi- 
nary in every Western State, where teachers should 
be trained to supply the country, and the plan was 
successfully carried out in some cities." 1 

Miss Beecher had fully formulated her plan of 
education and professions for women, and devoted 
some of her time to the preparation of works which 
should help forward her plan. Her works on Edu- 
cation and Domestic Economy, published in 1845 
and 1846, under the care of the Harpers of N. Y., 
had a wide circulation, and brought her an income 
which she freely spent in the promotion of her edu- 
cational schemes. The latter part of the work men- 
tioned by Mrs. Stowe, the founding of schools in 
the West, with an especial view to the training of 
teachers, was carried out by Miss Beecher at 
Milwaukee, Wis., Dubuque, Iowa, and attempted 
in other places. 

141 The first two classes of teachers sent out by this Board were 
prepared under the superintendence of Miss C. E. Beecher, whose 
connection with the Board terminated with the year 1847." Vide 
Gov. Slade's Report, dated Jan. I, 1852, p. 13. 



CHAPTER III. 

MISS MORTIMER AND MISS BEECHER. 

Ill health, the trial of past years, had come 
again to Miss Mortimer. The cholera, mentioned 
in the last letter from Ottawa, in the strain it 
brought upon her physically, mentally, and in feel- 
ing, was but an occasion for the old foe, lurking in 
ambush, to spring forth from its hiding place and 
try her faith and patience once more. 

In this year, 1849, Miss Beecher made an educa- 
tional visit to the West. 

Miss Mortimer wrote from — 

"Ottawa, June 12, 1849. 

'* Last week I received a letter from Miss Catherine 
Beecher which might amount to something, if I were 
not so independent a soul. Miss Beecher professes to 
have taken a liking to me, and builds an 'air-castle,' as 
she calls it, in which she puts me as ' leading spirit/ 
and goes on to tell us that for such a plan as she pro- 
poses she can pledge us money enough, and even adds 
that she will not be strenuous for her favorite notions 
save one or two which she considers essential to the 
permanency of the school. 

"She wishes, if I fall in with her ideas, that I go to 
Hartford this summer, to visit schools, talk over plans, 
etc. I replied to Miss B., stating the condition of my 

[115] 



116 MARY MORTIMER. 

health, and my consequent unfitness to undertake any 
great enterprise. I told her of my love of indepen- 
dence, my dislike of worldly policy, thanked her for 
her kind intentions, and assured her that I warmly re- 
ciprocated her feelings of regard, and should be happy 
to make myself useful in the great work in which she is 
engaged. I spoke of worldly policy, because I wanted 
her to understand me on this point " [referring to con- 
versation " when she was here "]. 

"In 1849," says W. W. Wight, Esq. (see " An- 
nals of Milwaukee College"), Miss Beecher "was 
seeking contributions in the East to establish en- 
dowed professional schools for young women in 
which their distinctive duties should be made a 
science and a remunerative profession, as were the 
liberal professions for men. In many a parlor and 
lecture-room Miss Beecher grew eloquent over her 
favorite theme. Many a young teacher became 
enthusiastic as Miss Beecher unfolded in private 
audience the merits of her plan ; many an elder 
instructor, perusing Miss Beecher' s ' The True 
Remedy for the Wrongs of Women ' and other 
volumes, warmed to her theories and sought for 
closer intimacy with them. One of these books 
particularizing her educational theories fell into the 
hands of Mrs. Parsons of Milwaukee, who, with her 
associates and leading citizens, examined and ap- 
proved it. The result was a correspondence be- 
tween Miss Beecher and Mrs. Parsons which 
attracted the former lady's interested attention, 



THE LIFE WORK. 117 

and resulted in an earnest invitation to her to visit 
Milwaukee, and to address the citizens in behalf of 
a permanent school of a high order. This invita- 
tion. . . . Miss Beecher accepted," and in the 
autumn of 1849 submitted her plans to citizens of 
Milwaukee. 

Miss Mortimer's long previous acquaintance with 
Mrs. Parsons at Le Roy, her visit to Milwaukee on 
her first coming West in Sept., 1848, just as Mrs. 
Parsons was opening the school there, and Mrs. 
Parsons ' invitation, twice repeated in the winter of 
1849-50 to Miss Mortimer to give up the Ottawa 
field, and join in teaching the increasingly prosper- 
ous Milwaukee school, have been gleaned by the 
attentive reader from the correspondence quoted. 

No reference in the letters of Miss Mortimer is 
made to a place of location for the ''air-castle" 
which Miss Beecher built for Miss Mortimer after 
having become acquainted with her at Ottawa in 
the first half of the year 1 849. It was more impor- 
tant that Miss Mortimer should be won as a co- 
adjutor in carrying out Miss Beecher's educational 
plan than to settle immediately upon a location in 
the wide field Miss Beecher sought to influence ; 
especially as Miss Mortimer was slow to yield her 
independence, and felt, also, that her weakened 
health was a serious objection to her acceptance 
of Miss Beecher's proposals. 

But Miss Beecher, with characteristic energy and 
benevolence, set about the removal of this chief 



118 MARY MORTIMER. 

obstacle, and the autumn of 1 849 saw these two 
ladies for a brief period together at Round Hill 
Water Cure, Northampton, Mass. 

Miss Mortimer, after vacation-visits to her friends 
in Phelps, Auburn and Elmira, N. Y., writes: — 

"Oct. 25, 1849. 

"I had so busy a week that I made my arm lame. 
The day after this, I received a letter from Miss 
Beecher. It was very kind,* expressed much interest 
and confidence, but still lacked clear, distinct state- 
ments in regard to the future. She closed with a wish 
for a full history of my ailments, and expressed a hope 
of being able to take me to a Water Cure Establishment, 
She said nothing about time, except that in a fortnight 
I should receive definite word as to ' time, place and 
plan. ' 

" One week afterward, instead of two, came a second 
letter, wishing me to set off immediately for this place. 
I hesitated and pondered. E. objected, and my caution 
seconded his objections. But I could seem to see how 
Miss Beecher would obviate all these objections, and I 
feared it would be treating her ungenerously to refuse to 
come. . . . 

" I yielded ; set off on Tuesday and after a prosper- 
ous journey reached the delightful town of Northampton 
yesterday. I took a carriage to this establishment and 
received a kind greeting from Miss Beecher who is here 
under hydropathic treatment. The good lady has just 
reminded me that I must not write ; I must obey. All 
looks pleasant here." 

Seven weeks later, Miss Mortimer writes from — 



THE LIFE WORK. 119 

"Glen Haven Water Cure, 

"Tues. eve., Dec. n, 1849. 

"Here I am, about two hundred and fifty miles 
nearer you (Elmira, N. Y.) than when I last wrote you, 
and with six more weeks ' experience in the Water Cure. 
Glen Haven is a lone spot between two lofty ridges of 
hills, at the head of Skaneateles Lake. It is very pleasant 
in summer, with the beautiful, placid lake in front, the 
hills covered with verdure, and nature, in her wildness 
and beauty, on either hand, — but now it is rather 
dreary. In the volume of the future, however, unre- 
vealed, lies my fate. I have wandered about rather 
strangely, very unexpectedly, for the last year. When 
and where I shall go next, I know not. 

"... 1 rejoice in the good news from you and I 
trust you will be prospered more and more. As to my- 
self, I met Miss Beecher at Round Hill as I wrote F. I 
anticipated. We talked over matters, and, owing to 
my crippled condition, and to the probability that Miss 
B. would soon leave the (Northampton) Water Cure, 
concluded that I would better come to this place, which 
is not very far from my friends. With considerable 
difficulty I persuaded Miss B. that I could come alone. 
She wrote letters to the railroad conductors, and to the 
proprietor of the Delevan House at Albany, to secure 
to me all needed attention. She wrote also to the 
Doctor's wife here, recommending me to their care. 
She packed my trunks, and with a ' God bless you ' 
dismissed me Wednesday morning. My journey passed 
off finely. Everything was done for me. I passed 
the night at the 'Delevan' and reached Auburn Thurs- 
day, and made arrangements to come to this Haven 



120 MARY MORTIMER. 

the next day. I think I never felt more deeply under 
obligations to friends than now. Miss Beecher has 
been so kind, so benevolent, so thoughtful, and my 
brothers and sisters have been so sympathizing and 
kind and helpful. I have no words to express my 
gratitude. God bless them all. . . . 

" M. came here with me. My foot and arm are bet- 
ter, still I am very lame. The doctor gives me consid- 
erable encouragement in regard to a cure. He thinks I 
must have rather moderate treatment for a while. . . . 

"Let me hear from you as soon as possible. I shall 
need all the consideration of my friends, added to all 
the heroism I can muster, to keep up my courage 
through this dreary winter." 

The next letter is dated "Auburn, Feb. 26, 
1850," and gives a graphic description of her in- 
valid life at the Glen Haven Sanitarium. From 
the treatment there she had derived the greatest 
benefit, so that she was never again crippled in her 
foot by the recurrence of the lameness. 

She writes : — 

"I can but wish, that just as an illustration of the Water 
Cure, and as a satisfactory explanation of all my past 
aches and pains, miserable feelings and lamenesses, you 
could have seen me this winter. . . . Some of the 
Water Cure patients think Job never arrived at the 
climax of human trials. ... I like the treatment very 
well, but only in the bright hope of a restoration to 
health, could I have borne it so well. Blessings on the 
water ! I feel enthusiastic about it." 



THE LIFE WORK. 121 

But the enforced leisure from accustomed occu- 
pation had not allowed the teeming brain to be 
idle. A time of thought and feeling, of growth, 
the " dreary winter" had evidently been. 

Under the same date Miss Mortimer writes : — 

" There is something more delightful to me than I 
can express in the ideas of light and truth. I love to 
dwell upon them, but sometimes I dare not ; my spirit 
gets too much excited for my body to bear, — indeed, I 
believe this is always the case. ... In some way I 
have a sense of emancipation of late which is very de- 
lightful. All winter, the idea of liberality has been 
gradually developing itself to me. Party-spirit, sec- 
tarianism, bigotry, narrow-mindedness, have always 
been very hateful to me. I have sought and intended 
to be free from them, but have failed, partly because 
of my evil, headstrong nature, partly because I did 
not see. 

"■ I seem to see now, as I have not seen before, how 
people may differ very much, and yet be working for 
the same end, tending toward the same result,— nay, 
more, that it is best they should work differently. All 
sorts of good qualities need to be developed in us and 
in others; characters differently constituted will pro- 
duce different effects, and thus each do good in its 
place. Again different natures can work but under 
different influences. Some people are Methodists by 
nature ; it would be a pity, even admitting Presbyteri- 
anism to be nearer the truth, to drag them into the 
Presbyterian ranks — they would in reality believe the 
same, have the same characters, but being out of their 



122 MARY MORTIMER. 

element, would be trammeled in their feelings and 
actions. Some people are born abolitionists (you will 
smile and say among this class is your friend M.). 
Some are not. Different parties, different sects, are, 
to a great extent, expressions of differences of human 
character. I cannot think they will ever trouble me so 
much as they have done, yet I cannot believe myself, 
comparatively, ever to have been very bigoted. I do 
not think, dear Miss T., that I have made myself very 
clear ; but do not fear that I am getting reckless of the 
distinctions between truth and error; that I am falling 
upon the pernicious theory that ' it is no matter what a 
man believes so long as he is honest.' I do see, more 
and more, or seem to see, that we know almost nothing; 
that principles which, to our short-sighted vision, ap- 
pear opposite, in the light of Heaven may be shown 
to be in beautiful harmony ; that shades of difference 
about which parties and sects and individuals contend 
violently, bitterly, and as if truth were at stake, in that 
same light may appear too insignificant to be worthy of 
notice." 

The correspondence between Mrs. Parsons, the 
citizens of Milwaukee, and Miss Beecher, had re- 
sulted in alliance and a change of name for the 
Milwaukee School. It had now become " The 
Milwaukee Normal Institute and High School " and 
gathered both day pupils and boarders into the 
double house on the corner of Milwaukee and 
Oneida streets. The faculty, as it was now ar- 
ranged, was to consist of * 4 a board of co-equal 
teachers," Mrs. Parsons, Miss Mortimer, Miss E, 



THE LIFE WORK. 123 

B. Warner, and Miss Newcombe, late Miss Morti- 
mer's associate at Ottawa. 

Under date of March 28, 1850, Miss Mortimer 
writes from Buffalo, where she is en route with Miss 
Beecher for her first work as a teacher in Milwau- 
kee : - 

"Your very kind letter reached me yesterday, and at 
the same time a line from Miss Beecher charging me to 
meet her in Geneva last evening, preparatory to setting 
out for the West at six o'clock this morning. This was 
agreeable to the arrangement we made last week. . . . 
Miss Beecher has been writing a book which I hope 
you will see as soon as may be. It will probably be 
out in a few weeks, — is entitled 'Truth Stranger than 
Fiction/ and will be, I doubt not, noticed in some way 
in the Obsei-ver. . . . Write me, immediately, at 
Milwaukee, what you wish done. . . . We reached 
here at one p. m. No boat leaves to-night, so we shall 
be obliged to remain. The ' Queen City ' is announced 
for to-morrow at 10 a. m. We purpose to take passage, 
spend the Sabbath in Detroit, and proceed on Monday 
as fast as may be to Milwaukee, spend next week there, 
and the week after, go to Ottawa, Jacksonville, Quincy, 
etc., returning, — I do not know when. After this I 
expect the school [in Milwaukee] will be re-organized ; 
then Miss Beecher expects to return (East) and I shall 
be school-ma'am again." 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE MILWAUKEE SCHOOL. 

After reaching Milwaukee and conferring with 
the friends of the school there, Miss Beecher and 
Miss Mortimer proceeded to visit the young cities 
in Illinois to which Miss Mortimer's last letter refers. 
This was in pursuance of Miss Beecher's plan to 
establish schools for young women in promising 
centers in the Western States in order that the 
teachers needed for this region might be raised up 
and trained on the ground, thus, in time, obviating 
the expensive plan of importing them from the 
East. 

In a letter written May, 1850, to her sisters while 
on this journey, Miss Mortimer says : — 

"At Quincy, we were quite the lions, and were 
treated to the best cheer. The evening of the day after 
our arrival, we met a number of the gentlemen of the 
city. I read [a paper] and Miss B. talked. The next 
day Miss B. talked with the ladies, and they, as well as 
the gentlemen, seemed very much interested in Miss 
Beecher's plans and proposals to them. We saw a good 
many people, had fine opportunities of seeing the city 
and surrounding country, and found all very promising 
and interesting. All needful arrangements were made 
[124] 



THE LIFE WORK. 125 

preparatory to opening a school in the fall. Quincy is 
very finely situated, — is a beautiful city containing a 
large number of fine buildings and beautiful gardens. 
The country outside of the city is also very fine, and 
seems to be settled by people of property and some 
refinement. The city contains a valuable library. Miss 
B. thinks she shall want me to go to Quincy again in 
the fall, to aid in the organization of the school. 

"After a visit of three days, we took a steamer 
for St. Louis, at which city I was obliged to part with 
Miss Beecher, she taking the steamer for Cincinnati, I 
for the Illinois river. My respect for the good lady 
has been increasing during our journey, and I have 
seen several old acquaintances of hers. My impres- 
sions are confirmed by what they tell me. 

" I have not yet heard that Miss Beecher's book is 
published, but I have had the privilege of completing 
its perusal, and am anxious to learn that others are 
reading it. 

"My sail from St. Louis to Ottawa was not par- 
ticularly eventful, only, as often occurs, we were de- 
layed to the utmost extent of our patience. 

"At Peru, I learned that the slaves which escaped 
from the steamer on which we went to Naples, were 
not retaken. The Ottawa people, However, or rather, 
a small part of them, had a very serious struggle to out- 
wit their pursuers. 

"I received a very kindly greeting at Ottawa; have 
been there five days. ... It gives one a free, wild feel- 
ing to go over these broad prairies and see the heavens 
and the earth meet, with nothing to obstruct the 



126 MARY MORTIMER. 

"I do feel sorry that our school there is among the 
things that were. Some of the people mourn over its 
death, mourn almost with a determination not to be 
comforted. I left this morning (by canal) and find myself 
in a little the closest quarters in which I have ever been. 
I am afraid we shall stifle to-night. We reach Chicago 
to-morrow morning, if no accident befalls us on this 
roaring canal. I purpose to spend one day in Chicago, 
and go to Milwaukee on Friday. There we have very 
comfortable arrangements made for our accommodations 
in the way of rooms. . . . This is Miss Beecher's 
planning. Our school rooms are to be carpeted and 
furnished as nicely as if they were 'down East/ — our 
yard to be set out with flowers, etc. 

" I will try to send you the Prospectus of our school. 
It was written by Miss Beecher. 

"I am now feeling quite strong. My foot seems 
almost well now. . . . We commence school next 
week." 

To Miss Thurston : — 

" Milwaukee, May 18, 1850. 

[After detailing some unforeseen obstacles in the way 
of the school.] 

"One of the Trustees called last evening. I had a 
talk with him and felt somewhat encouraged. We have 
a smaller number of pupils than was expected, — and 
four professors of our dignity ! We in the faculty are 
all agreed warmly and fully in desiring to see Miss 
Beecher's undertaking for the West triumph. The 
family is pleasant, and we are very happy together. Be 
not anxious, we shall triumph, I trust; certainly we 
shall, if we are true to the trust put in our hands. 



THE LIFE WORK. 127 

"I have not been to church much yet; presume I 
shall settle at the New School Presbyterian. Our city 
is very dry, excessively dusty, — weather cold, trees 
hardly yet leaved out. Tlie season is of course very 
late." 

Mrs. Parsons adds a note in which she says : — 

" I have, many times this winter, wished to write you, 
but I have been driven and pressed with cares and 
duties, and, for some time, ill. Now, by the new ar- 
arangement, I am greatly relieved." 

To Miss T : — 

"July ii, 1850. 

"In Milwaukee I have fallen in love with its sunsets, 
the beautiful weather, and our glorious lake. I wish 
you could come and take a walk with me to its banks, 
next moon. And a sail, too, for I expect John, and 
then we shall have somebody to take care of us and row 
for us. 

" Have you seen Miss Beecher's book? Do propose 
to some one of your booksellers to send for it. It can 
be had in New York or Boston. 

"Miss Beecher has issued two circulars; — one to 
the clergymen of New England ; one to the ladies 
generally. I will ask her in my next to send you one 
of the latter, and I trust you will be able to do some- 
thing in the good cause. . . . 

" Miss Beecher writes me that she wishes me to go to 
Quincy in the fall if I can be spared here, — not other- 
wise. . . . She proposes to make something of a stir in 
the fall. She comes in the early part of September, 



128 MARY MORTIMER. 

and expects Miss , the heroine of her book, to ac- 
company her. 

". . . Mr. P. has received an invitation to go to 
Ottawa and settle as pastor of the Presbyterian church. 
He may accept in the fall, but it is uncertain. Mrs. P. 
says she will abide here until next spring. . . . 

" Our term closes two weeks from next Wednesday. 
At its close I shall probably go to visit my brother in 
Michigan and return the first of September. We expect 
to open our fall term the second week in September. 

" My prospect for health is, on the whole, encourag- 
ing. I have. . . . worked hard this summer, still am 
much stronger than at the beginning of the term. My 
foot is not quite well yet, but it is better than it has 
been these seven years in warm weather." 

"Milwaukee, Aug. 24, 1850. 

"Do you know, dear Miss T., how glad we will be to 
see you? M. A. and L. A. and your sister Mary, — and 
how much good it will do you to see us and our broad, 
beautiful lakes, our wide-spreading prairies, our rising 
cities, and much else ? 

"You can come in three days. At Buffalo, buy a 
ticket of the R. R. line through to Milwaukee. It will 
be only eight or nine dollars, and you will be brought 
to our door two days after you leave Buffalo. The 
autumns are delightful here, the lakes are beautiful for 
sailing. 

"Let us hear very soon what you will do about com- 
ing, but do not decide against us. . . . Our next term 
commences Sept. 11. We expect Miss Beecher about 
a week before." 



THE LIFE WORK. 129 

Mrs. Parsons adds : — 

"Do set out upon the expedition you have so long 
talked of to the West. It is surely more important for 
you to see the West than the South. Please give my 
best love to Miss C. and assure her that I am very de- 
sirous to see her here with you. Her presence will 
quite complete the happy arrangement. . . . M. has 
probably told you of our circumstances and prospects. 
If you delay your visit to another year, I may be far 
from here." 

To Miss T. and Miss C. : — 

" Milwaukee, Sept. 6, 1850. 

" I think our beautiful autumn weather has com- 
menced, and our cholera seems to have nearly bidden 
us adieu. We have had a great storm, almost a freshet, 
but our sky is clear and beautiful to-day, our air is 
fresh, invigorating and cool. I took a long, long walk 
this morning, went to the lake. How glorious it is with 
the dazzling morning sun upon it ! You will come and 
see it, will you not ? . . . After you have sent me your 
decision, I will send you all sorts of directions about 
the journey. . . . 

"We expect Miss Beecher to-night, — are likely to be 
crowded with boarding pupils if not day pupils. ... I 
send you a (bad) picture of Milwaukee, hoping even 
this may be of some interest to you. Our city thinks 
exceedingly well of itself, notwithstanding doing itself 
so little justice on paper. May you have a glorious 
time, dear F., if you go to hear Jenny Lind, — worth a 
thousand times the money it will cost. I am feeling 
almost well — mean to do something in our world yet. 
10 



130 MARY A/OR TIMER. 

Tell me, F., how you like Dickens' Ballad which I sent 
you. I read Emerson on my last journey from 
Chicago. . . . 

"Have I not sent you word that we keep a ' Normal 
Institute and High School' and not a 'Ladies' Semi- 
nary ' ? " 

"On Sept. ii, 1850" says Mr. Wight, "Miss 
Beecher delivered an address at the Institute rooms, 
for the purpose of expounding the plan of educa- 
tion which her long experience had taught her to 
be the best. ' 1 How the plan impressed one listener 
appears by the following extract from an anony- 
mous newspaper letter of the time. 

" 'Such a school as Miss B. proposes is exactly 
in keeping with the character and wants of this 
thriving city, and its citizens would be committing 
a sort of educational suicide by permitting this op- 
portunity for establishing a school of the first order 
to pass unimproved., 

' ' Within a month after this visit, another gifted 
woman — Frederika Bremer — called at the school, 
saw many handsome young girls, made them a 
speech, and congratulated them on being Americans. 
{Homes of the New World, I, 615.) This was not 
the only connection of the author of The Neighbors 
with this institution. The system of calisthenics 
hereinafter described was introduced as the result 
of a conference between Miss Beecher and Miss 
Bremer. The latter lady explained the Swedish 

1 Annals of Milwaukee College. 



THE LIFE WORK. 131 

method of gymnastic exercise for women, which so 
commended itself to Miss Beecher that she caused 
its introduction here. It is curious to observe that 
this system . . . has recently been critically ex- 
amined in Sweden by an American educator with a 
view to its introduction into the schools of Milwau- 
kee, as a novelty" — forty years after it was intro- 
duced by Miss Beecher at Milwaukee College ! 

To her friend and former pupil, Miss M. E. Hill, 
Miss Mortimer writes from — 

" Milwaukee, Sept. 16, 1850. 
'You may perhaps have learned that I have become 
a teacher in this city, in a school organized by Miss 
Beecher, or rather, by us on Miss Beecher's plan, 
which accompanies this letter. In this plan and its 
author, I have become very much interested, and feel 
sure you would be equally interested were you ac- 
quainted with them. 

"We are prospectively in .want of teachers, and I 
write to inquire if you can give us any hope of obtain- 
ing your services. I send you a pamphlet containing 
Miss B's. general plan, and a paper containing our plan 
in particular. From these documents you will gather 
that each teacher on this plan holds a more important, 
independent and satisfactory place than do assistant 
teachers in any school, and at the same time has less 
care, responsibility and labor than a principal. It is 
proposed that each teacher shall teach only about four 
hours per day. . . . 

"For the present we are in want of such a character 
as yourself, to spend the winter with us, to give us 



132 MARY MORTIMER. 

some aid, to learn our system, and to qualify herself to 
take in the spring the first or second departments in the 
school. 

"Allow me to add, dear Miss H., that we are a 
pleasant company, and our situations as teachers are 
among the most pleasant and improving possible. If, 
therefore, your parents can consent to spare you, I can 
but think you would like the situation. Our distance 
from you is not formidable, and I think I am not exag- 
gerating when I say we are enlisted in one of the noblest 
and most important enterprises of the age. Think care- 
fully and decide benevolently, and reply to this as soon 
as possible." 

To the same : — 

"Nov. 6, 1850. 

"... Should you come you would be expected to take 
one of the four departments described in the prospectus 
I sent you, — perhaps my own, which is that of Govern- 
ment and Moral Instruction, — and be responsible for 
it. You would be expected to teach four or five hours 
a day, and when school hours are over, if the proposed 
boarding-plan goes into operation next spring, to be 
pretty much free from care. . . . 

" Our path is not all plain before us yet, — our enter- 
prise is not fully appreciated, — not so fully as I think 
it will be by next Spring. I do not like to take the re- 
sponsibility of saying promising things about our pros- 
pects, or in any other way of urging your coming. 
. . . We are teaching on what we believe to be a more 
thorough and liberal plan than is adopted in schools 
generally, and the first year here needs to be one of 
training and preparation. Perhaps I shall not flatter 



THE LIFE WORK. 133 

myself if I say that I have for years taught more inde- 
pendently of my text-books than the generality of 
teachers, still I find it necessary to study carefully and 
much, to teach as I am now teaching. 

"I am giving my services this year for one hundred 
and fifty dollars or less, and I may add, I have never 
had more than two hundred. I do not consent to such 
terms because I think, compared with other professions, 
this is a fair compensation. I think teachers are not 
paid enough. I can illy afford to give my time and 
strength as I do give them, but there are other and 
weightier considerations. Please think over this sub- 
ject again, in the clearest light of Christian benevo- 
lence. Our enterprise is young, is unappreciated. It 
cannot afford high salaries, — it needs teachers who care 
for higher rewards than the salaries men can give, and 
such I believe you to be, therefore I hope Providence 
will point out the way for you to come. 

" Our school numbers a little more than one hundred. 
We have a very valuable library, mostly historical and 
literary, and a philosophical apparatus. . . . 

" Miss Beecher proposes to me to take the normal de- 
partment, which it is expected will be added to our 
school next spring or fall." 

To Miss T : — 

" Milwaukee, Dec. 20, 1850. 

". . . Our term has closed now, and we have a little 
respite. ... It was precious to us, dear Miss T., that 
dear little visit, — and you comfort us in the thought 
that it was pleasant and healthful to you. The great 
West, with its faults and its virtues, is well worth look- 
ing at. 



134 MARY MORTIMER. 

"Our term has passed away profitably on the whole. 
I get more and more interested and attached here. . . . 
I get some pretty warm friends among the pupils, after 
so long a time, and think some good has been done. 
. . . Our church is increasing in size, in usefulness, in 
vitality, I trust, under Mr. Spencer's care. He is a 
very good man, I think, though I fear he and I will not 
agree. Our Historical Society has made some good 
impression I think, and I hope much from it in the 
future. . . . 

"A day or two since, Dr. S. called to see us, — ex- 
pressed himself very friendly. By some means he 
gained admittance to our public Historical meeting. 
... I gave an address to the Historical Society which 
I hear he is extolling very much. . . . 

"Our next term promises well. I am to write a 
speech to be presented to the Trustees." 

Mrs. Parsons adds a note in which she says, 
"We [herself and husband] may remain a year or 
more." 

The trustees referred to in Miss Mortimer's letter 
of the winter vacation, 1850, are there first men- 
tioned. The enterprise had then been changed 
from one of a private nature in Mrs. Parsons' hands 
to one on Miss Beecher's plan, and Mrs. Parsons 
had surrendered the entire control of the school to 
a board of trustees who were incorporated by the 
Legislature of Wisconsin. 

The enabling act, approved March 1, 185 1, 
names nine prominent citizens of Milwaukee as 
trustees, with power to increase their number to 



THE LIFE WORK. 135 



fifteen, and constitutes them and their successors 
,l a body corporate and politic " " for the education 
of females" "and for that purpose to remain in 
perpetual succession. " 

They are to have the directing, prescribing, and 
appointing powers usually lodged in such a body, 
and ' ' power and authority to grant such literary 
honors and degrees as are usually granted by col- 
leges and seminaries of learning in the United 
States, and in testimony of such grants, to give 
suitable diplomas under their seals, which diplomas 
shall entitle the possessors respectively to the 
immunities and privileges which by usage or 
statute are allowed to the possessors of similar 
diplomas granted by colleges and seminaries of 
learning." 

' ' Supplied with this charter, the Trustees issued 
their first circular Aug. I, 185 1. It states that 
the institution ' is in successful operation, having 
over two hundred names upon its roll during the 
last four terms, and having a full and able faculty 
of instruction. ' Further we read : — 

"The institution is organized upon the college plan, 
which, for securing the efficiency and permanency of 
literary institutions, is doubtless the best that has yet 
been discovered. A normal department is prominently 
mentioned by the Trustees, and . . . much importance 
is attached to this subject. Miss Beecher's guiding 
hand appears from the following clause in the cir- 
cular : — 



136 MARY MORTIMER. 

" 'The institution is entirely free from any sectarian 
or denominational character or control. It throws it- 
self upon the sympathies of the entire community. The 
great principles of truth as laid down by the Bible and 
echoed from every man's reason — principles lying at 
the base of our American institutions, and of all genuine 
virtue — will be carefully inculcated.' 

"The Trustees then state what the Institute has, what 
it needs, and what it expects : — 

"'The institution has already an endowment of 
$1000 in library and apparatus. This was given through 
Miss C. E. Beecher by a number of the friends of edu- 
cation. ... It was given, not upon the condition that 
the institution should be controlled by foreign influence, 
but that it should be organized upon the superior plan 
of colleges, and that the citizens should provide its 
accommodations. The institution is greatly in need of 
a spacious, convenient, and commanding location and 
building. The Trustees are now confidently assured that 
if the citizens of Milwaukee will do liberally themselves, 
Eastern friends, who hope much for the intelligence 
and-true prosperity of our country from such institutions, 
will cheerfully contribute the balance necessary to com- 
plete the desired building. ... As friends of Milwau- 
kee and the cause of education, we invite your sympathy 
and co-operation. ' 

"While the trustees were thus appealing to the 
citizens of Milwaukee, Miss Beecher was addressing to 
a wider audience the Appeal which embodied her 
plan." 

This circular is evidently the same as that to 
which Miss Mortimer refers in her correspondence 



THE LIFE WORK. 137 

of the preceding year. It is an undated pamphlet, 
entitled ' ' An appeal to American Women in Their 
Own Behalf." 

Its design was to commend the Milwaukee 
School and to set forth its claims upon the be- 
nevolent. The institution is therein said to be — 

I. Non-Sectarian. 

Miss Beecher says under this head : — 

"The grand difficulty in our newer settlements is 
the multiplicity of sects, and the difficulty of bringing 
them to harmonize in the support of schools. . . . 

"The method adopted at Milwaukee has been en- 
tirely successful and is briefly this : An offer was made 
to the citizens to furnish them four good teachers, and 
one thousand dollars' worth of library and apparatus, 
on condition that they should hire temporary quarters 
for the school, furnish enough pupils to sustain the 
teachers, raise a fund to be drawn upon for the support 
of these teachers in case the income from the school 
were inadequate, and finally that the institution should 
be organized on the college system ; that is, that there 
should be a faculty of co-equal teachers, instead of a 
principal and subordinate teachers. This served as a 
stimulus to exertion, the terms ottered were complied 
with, and the result was that a very large school of the 
highest order has been sustained nearly two years, 
while every Protestant minister and church of the city 
unites in recommending and sustaining it. There is a 
Board of Trustees created, in which most of the de- 
nominations of the place are represented, and the 
pledge is given that every denomination shall have equal 



138 MARY MORTIMER. 

privileges, and that the peculiar tenets of none shall be 
urged upon the pupils." 

The appeal is enforced by these further consid- 
erations upon which the writer enlarges : — 

II. The economical method employed in apply- 
ing benefactions. 

III. The use of the college plan. 

IV. The leading object, to educate women for 
their profession. 

V. Its proposed assistance to women seeking em- 
ployment in their profession. 

Miss Beecher's idea of "woman's profession" 
was that it comprised — 

i. The care and development of the human body 
in the earliest period of life. 

2. The training of the human mind. 

3. The conservation of the domestic state. 

"The normal department was to be an active, aggres- 
sive agency in preparing women for, and assisting them 
to employment, especially as teachers. 

"The Rev. W. L. Parsons, who had previously 
resigned his pastorate, was appointed secretary and 
financial agent of the Board of Trustees. He now 
devoted himself to soliciting assistance for the most 
pressing need of the young and prosperous school, that 
of a home. It was still domiciled in the straitened 
quarters at the corner of Milwaukee and Oneida streets, 
where " desks were impracticable, except in a large back 
room used only for drawing and writing. The few 
pupils in painting wrought by the light of an east win- 



THE LIFE WORK. 139 

dow — the study their teacher's bedroom. Amid all 
these disadvantages how rich were some of the instruc- 
tors in inventing pleasant surprises to make more at- 
tractive the daily routine ! . . . Lessons in history 
were emphasized by evening gatherings for reading or 
by historical tableaux. Yet into all that served to 
make the school days such happy ones entered also 
most tender solicitude for the development of that 
which was of highest moment to each one. There was 
the little journal, in which every afternoon before leav- 
ing some note was to be made of desires awakened or 
hopes cherished, of bad defeats or victories gained. 
One room above became a hushed and hallowed place, 
as each week, teacher and taught knelt after close of 
school, that deepest yearnings and new-found purposes 
might have the seal of heaven." 

In the summer of 185 1 Miss Mortimer spent her 
vacation in New York State with her old friends. 
To Miss Hill, who had not yet yielded to Miss 
Mortimer's invitations of the previous year, she 
wrote, on the eve of returning to Milwaukee. 

"Le Roy, Sept. 2, 1851. 
" . . . I am on my way to Milwaukee. I expect we 
shall need a teacher, and still my preference is for you. 
. . . Our prospects, we think, are becoming fixed and 
prosperous. We fully expect to see a fine building 
erected next summer." 

Mrs. Parsons was now in the East with her hus- 
band, assisting to bring the school and its needs to 
the notice of the friends of education. Miss 



140 MARY MORTIMER. 

Mortimer, after arriving in Milwaukee, writes again 
to Miss Hill, under date of — 

" Sept. io, 1851. 

"We want you immediately; the terms I mentioned 
last winter. ... I hope, dear Miss H., you will be 
quite decided to join us as soon as you receive this. 
. . . Mrs. Parsons will be absent for some weeks, 
so that we shall be in greater need than six weeks 
hence. 

" I have no fears of your fitness unless you have been 
retrograding since I had the pleasure of teaching you. 
Come with an earnest, free, trusting heart, determined, 
by the strength and wisdom which cometh from above, 
to be a light and a blessing, and all will be well. We 
shall put no trammels upon you. We wish you to have 
a mind of your own and to use it. 

" Our term opens to-morrow." 

With excellent teachers the school was prosper- 
ing, and foundations seemed to be laid for perma- 
nent advance. For a few weeks in the autumn of 
185 1 Miss Mortimer was forced to leave her 
work, now growing so dear, for recuperation, in the 
family of one of her Chicago pupils. 

The winter of 185 1-2 passed pleasantly away. 
Miss Cornelia Bradley and Miss Morilla Hill had 
become members of the faculty. An invitation was 
extended to Miss Mortimer's dear friend of many 
years, Mrs. Charles Bradley (formerly Miss M. A. 
Bradley) to become associated with this band of 
remarkable teachers. Had Mrs. Bradley's health 



THE LIFE WORK. \\\ 

allowed her to accept, it would have completed an 
arrangement most satisfactory to Miss Mortimer 
and the friends of the school. 

The anniversary exercises, until two or three 
years subsequent to this time, were held in the 
spring. Two young ladies were graduated in the 
spring of 185 1. There was no senior class in 
1852, the last year in which the school was con- 
ducted in its original quarters. 

This was a period of great activity among the 
special friends of the Institution, both East and 
West. In Milwaukee this culminated in the spring 
of 1852 in the purchase of the present fine site of 
the College at the corner of Milwaukee and Division 
streets (now Juneau avenue), and preparations for 
the immediate erection of a building suited to the 
needs of the school. This building was designed 
for the accommodation of day pupils only. Both 
Miss Beecher and Miss Mortimer were opposed to 
the plan of gathering large numbers of girls under 
one roof, out of school hours. After the breaking 
up of the home and school in the double house on 
the corner of Milwaukee and Oneida streets in the 
spring of 1852, there was no boarding department 
connected with the school for some years, although 
both teachers and pupils from abroad felt the need 
of better provision for a home than was accessible. 

In regard to this point, Miss Beecher was not 
blind. Yet her aversion to large boarding schools 
was greater than to the present lack of suitable 



142 MARY MORTIMER. 

home accommodations for teachers and pupils from 
a distance. 

The early days of April, 1852, find Miss Mortimer 
at the East, whither she had gone that she might 
be with Miss Beecher for consultation during the 
summer intervening between the closing of the 
school in its old quarters and its contemplated 
autumn opening in the new edifice. 

To Miss Hill Miss Mortimer writes from — 

"Hartford, April 7, 1852. 

"I have tried to gather some definite information to 
send you, but all seems rather airy as yet. Miss B. 
has great plans and visions, and I can but believe she 
has great power also. I think in the course of a month 
I shall be able to judge something of our prospects in 
this direction. . . . Whatever may be the result, . . . 
we shall want you. ... I hope you will be most ear- 
nest to take care of your health. . . . 

" God grant we may be wisely guided, and kept from 
all evil and selfishness. 

" I reached Boston last Friday. Miss B. joined me 
on Saturday, and on Monday we left to go into the 
country, to spend two weeks or so in correspondence. 
We shall then, perhaps, go to New York. . . ." 

The month of May, 1852, was spent by Misses 
Beecher and Mortimer chiefly in New York City, in 
consultation with leading ladies of that city and vi- 
cinity. As a result of Miss Beecher's incessant ac- 
tivity in negotiations, and of the correspondence 



THE LIFE WORK. 143 

from Hartford in which Miss Mortimer and her- 
self had been previously engaged, an ' ' American 
Woman's Educational Association " was formed at 
this time. 

Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, with her husband 
and family, had removed from Cincinnati to Bruns- 
wick, Maine, on the acceptance by Prof. Stowe in 
1850 of the Professorship of Natural and Revealed 
Religion in Bowdoin College. Both Prof, and Mrs. 
Stowe had large and successful experience in teach- 
ing and profound interest in educational matters. 
Under a commission from the State of Ohio, Prof. 
Stowe had investigated the subject of Education in 
Europe, and made a report which excited wide 
interest, and was published by several States of the 
Union. Mrs. Stowe had been first a pupil in Miss 
Beecher's Hartford school, and later her associate 
in teaching, and was in profound sympathy with her 
elder sister's educational aims and methods. Mrs. 
Stowe since her return to New England had written 
" Uncle Tom's Cabin." This work had recently 
been issued in book form, and the world was trem- 
bling with the excitement it produced. 

To the home of Prof, and Mrs. Stowe under 
these circumstances Miss Beecher and Miss Morti- 
mer were invited for the summer of 1852, or so 
much of it as it should suit their convenience to 
spend there, while maturing the educational plans 
so dear to their hearts, and in which both host and 
hostess took so great an interest. 



144 MARY MORTIMER. 

Miss Mortimer's letters are almost entirely occu- 
pied with matters pertaining to the educational 
enterprise. 

To Miss Hill, Miss Mortimer writes : — 

11 Brunswick, Me., June 8, 1852. 

" We were gratified that you feel so much interest in 
our school, and believe 'it will succeed whether Miss 
Beecher does or not/ That is right. The school is 
needed, and with time and health, we can make it suc- 
ceed, whether wise ladies in the East help us or not. 

" Since I wrote you last, the ladies at Miss B.'s in- 
stigation, have formed an Association of which I send 
you the Constitution and list of the Board of Managers. 
The organization was formed in New York, where I 
was nearly four weeks. I had some intercourse with 
Mrs. [Caroline M.] Kirkland and liked her very much. 
The Association is of a highly respectable and influen- 
tial character. Most of the ladies of the Board have 
been heard from since their appointment. They ex- 
press much interest in the objects of the Association, 
and profess to feel highly honored in their appointment. 

" Beyond this I do not feel that any thing positive has 
yet been done. Miss Beecher proposes as the next 
step that the Executive Committee issue a circular, 
which she thinks will bring some money. May it be 
so. You must decide now what you can. I am skepti- 
cal rather than sanguine in my character, and am liv- 
ing on, hoping something will come, but deciding 
nothing. 

"We came to this place from Boston last week. . . . 
In regard to school next winter, Mr. Parsons writes us 



THE LIFE WORK. 145 

( ground is broken' toward the new house; ' brick will be 
laid next week.'' This was two weeks ago. 

" We have retired to a quiet town and here propose, 
as fast as possible, to get a course of study arranged. 
. . . Miss Beecher is proposing to have our Executive 
Committee call a convention of teachers (ladies) to be 
held in a quiet, private manner about August, to dis- 
cuss the course of study we propose, and various other 
topics relating to female education. Mrs. Gen. Gould 
has written, urging that the Convention be in Roch- 
ester." 

To the same : — 

"Brunswick, Me., June 21, 1852. 

". . . Your letter made me sad as to the state of 
your health, and the almost certain prospect that you 
cannot return with me. I know too well the hazard, 
the misery of attempting to do a teacher's duty with 
broken health to press you, though I shall not willingly 
change you for any one else.' . . . 

"We shall get this course of study definitely and 
somewhat minutely arranged, I think. I am hoping it 
will diminish our care and labor. When the Normal 
Department gets endowed, I think your aunt would like 
to take charge of one of the departments in it, and that 
we should like to have her, and more too; — that we 
can give her a situation congenial to her tastes and 
which will not ruin her health. When we women get 
half such good times as professors in college have, we 
shall not need to make such havoc with our health as 
we now do. 
11 



146 MARY MORTIMER. 

"The circular which accompanies this will give you 
an idea or two. ..." 

The circular referred to was soon published. 
After contrasting the opportunities open to young 
men for education and professional studies with the 
very inferior opportunities offered to young women, 
it enumerates some of the consequent evils, and out- 
lines a plan for the Institution which has been al- 
ready given. The organization which puts forth 
the circular is known as the American Woman's 
Educational Association, and its constitution pro- 
vides that the- whole control of the business and 
funds shall be in a Board of Managers, who shall 
appoint their own officers, agents, and executive 
committee. This Board shall have power to per- 
petuate and increase itself, but the number from 
any one religious denomination shall never exceed 
one fifth of the whole. Not less than seven differ- 
ent denominations shall be represented in the 
Board, and a majority shall be ladies who are or 
have been practical teachers. 

The following are the Managers appointed by 
the meetings above-mentioned : — 

BOARD OF MANAGERS OF THE AMERICAN WOMAN'S 
EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION. 

Mrs. Z. P. G. Bannister, Newburyport, Mass. 
Mrs. L. H. Sigourney, Hartford, Conn. 
Mrs. Sarah J. Hale, Philadelphia, Pa. , 
Mrs. Emily C. Judson, Hamilton, N. Y. 



THE LIFE WORK. 



147 



Miss P. Fobes, Monticello, 111. 

Mrs. Gen. Gould, Rochester, N. Y. 

Mrs. Rev. S. Seager, Buffalo, N. Y. 

Mrs. E. Ricord, Newark, N. J. 

Mrs. E. Dyer, Chicago, 111. 

Mrs. H. B. Stowe, Brunswick, Me. 

Mrs. C. Van Rensselear, Burlington, N. J 

Mrs. Prof. Conant, Rochester, N. Y. 

Miss C. E. Beecher, Boston, Mass. 

Miss C. M. Sedgwick, New York. 

Mrs. Prof. Van Norman, New York. 

Mrs. Marcus Spring, New York. 

Mrs. E. L. Magoon, New York. 

Mrs. C. M. Kirkland, New York, 

Mrs. Prof. Webster, New York, 

Mrs. A. H. Gibbons, New York, 

Mrs. C. W. Milbank, New York, 

Mrs. James Beattie, New York, 

Miss Mary Field, Stockbridge, Mass., 

Miss Mary Mortimer, Milwaukee, Wis. 

Rev. William L. Parsons, ) 

Mrs. L. A. Parsons. 1 Secretaries and Agents. 

Mrs. Prof. Webster, Treasurer. 



Executive 
Committee. 



It is added : — 



"The most important features of the plan here pre- 
sented have been tested by experience. Two years ago 
the citizens of Milwaukee accepted and carried out the 
first condition, and an institution of over one hundred 
pupils conducted on the College plan, has so secured 
universal confidence that all the Protestant clergymen 
of the city unite in recommending it. The citizens are 



148 MARY MORTIMER. 

now erecting a handsome building for two hundred 
pupils as the fulfillment of the second condition, and 
the immediate object now before this Association is to 
raise the $20,000 for the endowment of the Normal De- 
partment of that Institution. 

"The Executive Committee of the American Wo- 
man's Educational Association issue this circular, its 
object being two-fold : first, to seek aid in raising this 
endowment, and, secondly, to obtain counsel in devis- 
ing a course of study and training in which woman's 
profession shall have its proper regard. 

"To effect this, the Executive Committee hereby 
appoint Mrs. H. B. Stowe, Miss C. E. Beecher, and 
Miss M. Mortimer as a Committee of Correspondence, 
requesting them to adopt such measures as they may 
deem expedient for effecting the above objects. 

"By direction of the Ex. Com. of the A. W. E. A. 
" C. M. Kirkland, Sec'y. 

"New York, June 22, 1852. 

" This plan in its broad compass " says W. W. 
Wight, Esq., the historian of Milwaukee College, 
' ' was the one adopted at Milwaukee, and had the 
plan been fully wrought out to a successful issue, 
doubtless this College would have been the pattern 
and model of all Colleges for the instruction of 
women all over the country." 

The appointment of Secretary to this Associa- 
tion withdrew the Rev. W. L. Parsons from special 
connection with the Milwaukee school, but Mrs. 
Parsons continued to teach there until, in 1854, at 



THE LIFE WORK. U9 



the request of the Association she undertook the 
organization and conduct of a similar school in 
Dubuque, Iowa. 

To Miss Hill, Miss Mortimer again writes from -A 

"Brunswick, July 28, 1852. 

"... I hear from Milwaukee that the walls of the 
new building are up and the roof on, that it 'shall be 
done for the fall term ' (I expect, a late one), and the 
trustees hope the teachers will hold themselves in 
readiness to return. 

". . . The Teacher's Convention is to be in Newark, 
N. J., during the week of the National Education Con- 
vention, which opens in that city, Aug. 10th. Our 
meetings will probably be Wednesday and Thursday. 
We hope for the presence of a number of 'wise 
women.' " 

To Miss Thurston : — 

"Brunswick, Me., July 19, 1852. 
"... There is a great commotion now, in relation 
to improvements in female education. . . . Our teach- 
er's meeting is decided to be at Newark, N. J. This 
decision is made mainly on account of the fact that the 
-' American Association for the Advancement of Educa- 
tion,' at the head of which is Bishop Potter, holds its 
annual session at Newark, and we wish to attend, and 
thought others would have the same desire. . . . 
Doubtless we may be able to gather up some wisdom 
from the gentlemen,— among the most distinguished, as 
they are, in the country. . . . We expect to get to 



150 MARY MORTIMER. 

Newark and put up at the Rev. Charles Beecher's the 
Saturday evening before. 

li I have a good many pleasant things this summer. 
Still, I am often tired. ... I am too sensitive and in- 
dependent, and love quiet too well, to enjoy this man- 
ner of life, but I pray for patience to do what is my 
duty. . . . 

"I shall hope to see you in Newark. I do n't know 
when I shall return your way. Miss Beecher seems to 
have no idea of letting me off till the last minute." 

To Miss Hill : — 

"Newark, N. J., Aug. 12, 1852. 

". . . The meetings of the gentlemen have been 
very interesting and improving, and the ladies, in a 
very quiet way, have interested themselves. . . . 

"My summer's somewhat changeable and fluctuating 
life is nearly over. I expect to retire into obscurity in 
a few days, and I pray that henceforth I may be so 
happy as to be permitted to live in retirement." 

Mrs. Parsons adds a note : — 

" I am sorry you are not well, not able to take vigor- 
ous hold of a great work with us again this winter. I 
have no idea of giving up Miss Mortimer, yet I know 
she must not be burdened with any more than her own 
appointed duties, in order to live and last at all. She 
must not undertake anything more than the few things 
others cannot do. Perhaps you will be able to join us 
at a future time, if not now, — perhaps yet take my De- 
partment. 



THE LIFE WORK. 151 

" Our building is going up and is very fine. We an- 
ticipate a very large school and plenty of hard work to 
do." 

i 'The Institute took possession of its incomplete 
school building early in October, 1852. Then the 
pupils began their labor of love in finishing. The 
gathering twilight of those autumn days found many 
willing fingers sewing on shades for the windows 
and on the solitary piece of carpeting for the plat- 
form. . . . All sorts of entertainments — ■ recep- 
tions, tea-parties, concerts, art exhibitions, private 
theatricals — followed one another in quick array, 
each contributing its quota of funds. . . . The fami- 
lies of the Trustees . . . are mentioned among 
many others in the early days, the efforts of whose 
members to raise money were assiduous and un- 
tiring." * 

The hope of Mrs. Parsons to " relieve Miss 
Mortimer from all except the few things others 
could not do " was not realized, as the following 
letter from Miss Mortimer will show. 

To Miss Hill : — 

"Milwaukee, Oct. 23, 1852. 

[After bemoaning the absence of two of her trusted 
associates.] 

". . . I hoped to see you on my way back, but at 
last was so hurried that I had hardly time to take 
breath. Mrs. P. wrote me that she was almost broken 

1 Wight's " Annals of Milwaukee College." 



152 MARY MORTIMER. 

down, and Miss W. was attacked with a fever that laid 
her helpless on her bed. Since my arrival in this city 
two weeks ago, I have been still more hurried, for 
very many things have needed to be done about our 
new building, and then, the very first day of school, 
Miss L. was taken ill, and has been unable to be in 
school since. I am almost broken down already, but 
hope to keep from being completely so, as prospects 
are brightening. Miss L. expects to be in school on 
Monday next, and we are hoping Miss W. will join us 
in the course of a week, and with her, I am looking 
for C. 

" Our building is very beautiful and commodious. We 
number one hundred and twenty pupils. 

"Tell me how you like our course of study. . . I am 
boarding at Judge Smith's on Spring St. Hill, and like 
the arrangement." 

The weariness and pressure of this great burden 
of labor and care find expression in a letter to 
Miss Thurston, dated — 

" Milwaukee, Nov. 27, 1852. 
" . . . Truly I find this is a weary world to live in. 
I feel sometimes my trust in it, my hope, my elasticity, 
my energy, almost gone, and I wonder, as I think of 
those who have traveled farther in the journey, and 
fought longer the battle, how they have borne it all. 
You, my dear friend, have fought bravely and borne up 
nobly in the conflict which in one way and another 
overcomes so many. I trust no sickness or other mis- 
fortune will come to crush you now. . . . 



THE LIFE WORK. 133 

"I reached here safely, but to find things here in a 
sorry condition ; the building unfurnished, and worse 
still, unfinished, a fair under way, and terribly bad 
weather. 

" The fair was rather a failure, — the weather was so 
bad, — only one hundred dollars being realized. We 
stirred about and commenced school two days after the 
time. We opened very well as to numbers, but the 
very first day Miss L. was taken ill, and Miss W. I had 
left at home very sick. Miss L. returned in a week and 
a half, and no sooner was she in school again than Miss 
F. gave out. I lived through it all, however, and at 
last, after I was somewhat the worse for wear, all the 
teachers took their places. 

" The building is very handsome and convenient, — 
we are still suffering for want of sufficient furniture, but 
hope to get this deficiency made up in time. 

". . . Mr. P. is in N. Y., and reports favorably. 
The ladies [of the Association] think the twenty thou- 
sand dollars can be raised in New York. They have 
voted $400 per annum to me, which I shall perhaps 
get." 

The citizens of Milwaukee had responded gener- 
ously to the calls for money to erect the new edi- 
fice, and the mothers and daughters, as we have 
seen, were indefatigable and ingenious in assisting 
to furnish the building. Miss Beecher gave a per- 
sonal contribution at this time of $400, and there 
were favorable reports as to the prospect of endow- 
ment for the Normal Department from the East. 



154 MARY MORTIMER. 

And yet the strain and discomfort attendant upon 
this year, so varied, and so full of struggle, were 
very great. 

The teachers addressed to the Trustees in the fall 
of 1852 a letter in which they call attention to some 
of their pressing needs : — 

" Our building is very meagerly furnished. The 
furniture dealer sends us no chairs. We have no evi- 
dence that they are even begun. The desks are not all 
fastened down ; the inkstands are not all inserted. We 
have been kept in confusion the whole term by his fail- 
ure to keep his engagements." 

The Faculty add : — 

" From the Ladies' Association at the East we receive 
very flattering prospects in regard to the endowment. 
There seems very little doubt now that the whole will 
be speedily secured. The income from it — fourteen 
hundred dollars — for the present year, is pledged, and 
the principal nearly so. This of course will neither pay 
your debt nor furnish your building, but it will secure 
the permanence of your school, do much to elevate its 
character and diminish its expense to you. It does 
seem to us it would be for the pecuniary profit of the 
school, as well as for its good name, to get a loan and 
furnish the building [in a manner] corresponding to 
itself and to the prospects of the school. Is it best, in 
order to escape a debt, that we drag along in our pres- 
ent unfurnished, uncomfortable condition ? ... In 
conclusion, gentlemen, we crave your patience with our 



THE LIFE WORK. 155 

reiterated plea for < more,' even after you have furnished 
us with spacious and beautiful halls. Alas ! their very 
beauty and spaciousness but the more impressively re- 
mind us of their nakedness." 

"The early fifties," says Mr. Wight, "were very 
difficult times for Milwaukee. Taxes for municipal 
improvements were heavy, much money was re- 
quired for developing the railroad facilities of the 
city, and a general feeling of poverty pervaded the 
citizens. " 

The change of name to "Milwaukee Female 
College" was made by Legislature in the winter of 
1852-3. 

The plea for furniture for the new building was 
not offered by the teachers before some, at least, 
of their number, had made sacrifices toward the 
same end. 

One of the pupils of these days writes : — 

"For salaries so small how devotedly those first 
teachers labored ! Miss Mortimer exercised great self- 
denial for the College, and would draw at times from 
her own pocket to add to its furniture a curtain, a bell, 
a table, and even a carpet." 

The autumn which had seen Miss Mortimer so 
worn down by the illness of most of the teachers 
was followed by a winter in which her one veteran 
associate was disabled. And yet the climate of the 
West aided her indomitable will to assert its su- 



156 MARY MORTIMER. 

premacy most successfully, and Miss Mortimer was 
enabled to remain at her post. 

The First Annual Report of the officers and 
pupils of the College was issued in the spring of 

1853. 

The Board of Instruction recognized five heads 
of Departments, of which Miss Mortimers was 
named Department of Superintendence of Instruc- 
tion and Teacher of Normal School, and the names 
of nine others who had taken part in instruction 
during the year are given. The number of pupils 
was one hundred and sixty-six. Two young ladies, 
both residents of Milwaukee, were graduated this 
year. 

One of these, Mrs. Mary (Selleck) Rogers, gives 
the following beautiful tribute to her teacher and 
friend : — 

"Joyfully would I contribute to the treasury whence 
you are to draw ; and regret that it is only a mite in 
comparison with the amount which I feel confident will 
come to you from other sources. 

" Miss Mortimer was for so many years, so much a 
friend and counselor that I have thought more of her 
as such ; still my recollections of her as a teacher are 
vivid and can never be otherwise. 

" It was in the spring of 1850 that she came to Mil- 
waukee with Miss Newcombe (afterward her sister-in- 
law) under the auspices of the Woman's Educational 
Association, whose work at the West was forwarded by 
the personal efforts of Miss Catherine Beecher. 



THE LIFE WORK. 157 



"Mrs. Parsons' school, which had for about two 
years been in successful operation, was merged in this 
enterprise, Mrs. P. and Miss Warner remaining as 
teachers under the new administration. Having en- 
tered this school during its first year, I had formed a 
very strong admiration for, and attachment to, Mrs. P. 
(she was also our minister's wife), and felt, as her new 
co-adjutor entered the field, that she could not have a 
warm place in my heart,— so opposite were they in 
manner and method. I missed the suavity of manner, 
the more graceful bearing, and very gentle tone of the 
former, — but O how soon time disclosed the grandeur 
and strength and warmth underlying the plainer and 
less attractive exterior of the latter ! 

" How pleasant were her Compositon and Literature 
classes, with her novel ways of drawing us out and 
forcing us to like to write, in spite of our dislike ! 
Listening to the recitations of younger girls I could not 
fail to appreciate her peculiar method of teaching them 
fractions, when out of her table-drawer would come 
oranges and apples to be divided and subdivided and 
the divisions so thoroughly explained that the dullest 
brain must needs comprehend. 

" In Bible and Mental Philosophy classes, how often 
would she suffer us to lose ourselves in the labyrinth of 
metaphysics, and then carefully seek to guide our way- 
out into the light of truth. It seemed sometimes as 
though she sought to make us strongest doubters, that 
we might prove more sincere believers. 

" And were ever History lessons made so intensely in- 
teresting? With what delight we listened, at the close 
of recitation, to some selection, or to a short lecture, 



158 MARY MORTIMER. 

prepared with special reference to the lesson. Well do 
we remember with what enthusiasm afterward we made 
diligent search in the library for material for our ( dia- 
logues/ or to find hints for costumes and all the acces- 
sories to successfully arrange our historical tableaux, — 
and the greatest pleasure of all was it to know that 
these very things were the fruit of our own suggestion. 

" A search for specimens for the Botany class would 
take us to the bank of the river, where, after a joyous 
ramble, we once seated ourselves in Jthe glowing sunset 
and gaily chatted over our lunch-baskets. Suddenly 
our ears caught the sound of distant singing, and soon, 
from the foliage emerged two little fairies, bearing be- 
tween them a tiny basket containing a bouquet and a 
note for each, — ' To the gentlest ; ' 'To the most studi- 
ous/ etc., which were read aloud and awarded by a 
vote of acclamation. We needed not a glance at the 
handwriting to assure us that all the pleasure of the 
hour was the outcome of the kind thought of our dear 
Miss Mortimer. 

" Thus delightful little surprises were always await- 
ing us. She never forgot that we were young and buoy- 
ant, and so was not content with simply filling out the 
school hours with their own measure, but sought in 
all happy, simple, and wholesome ways to make us 
feel that we had her heartiest sympathy, — that our 
school days should remain a beautiful memory, and the 
love of inquiry and study an ever-abiding delight. 

"Was it not this oneness with her pupils, this idealiz- 
ing as she taught, and her intense earnestness, that so 
drew us to her as a teacher? — this same sympathy, and 
entire truthfulness which bound her to us as an un- 
changing friend ? 



THE LIFE WORK. 159 

" Of this last trait, she has made the deepest impres- 
sion. I think none of her pupils, as they recall her 
words, given to develop a spiritual rather than a mental 
activity, can remember any cant phrases, or even ex- 
pressions peculiarly her own, — yet the words chosen 
were best fitted to time and place, — few, pointed, ear- 
nest. We do recollect her once saying that were she to 
sum up all virtues in one word, it should be ' truth.' 

" What power there often was in her simply reading 
a passage of Scripture in the devotional exercises of the 
morning; when, perhaps without any comment, she 
knelt down, and with voice trembling in its earnestness, 
she pleaded for us. We learned then something of 
those words, < With groanings that cannot be uttered.' 

" Her getting at the heart of a pupil was in the most 
quiet, unobtrusive manner. A few lines of counsel writ- 
ten in the little daily 'journal' or ' report-book ' which 
we kept for her eye alone, or of approval at the end 
of a composition, would reveal a heart alive to our 
best interest, and kindly appreciation of our feeble 
endeavors. 

" Dear friend ! as I write I" feel how poor and un- 
worthy is my attempt to portray the beauty and nobility 
of such a character. More and more as the days go 
on, and I miss her warm greeting and wise counsel, do 
I feel the power of the Psalmist's words : 'The memory 
of the just is blessed.' " 

The other member of the class of 1853 was Miss 
Mary Frances Smith, a daughter of Judge Smith of 
Milwaukee, with whose family Miss Mortimer found 
a delightful home during this school year, and often 
in later years. 



160 MARY MORTIMER. 

We have seen how heavy were the burdens un- 
der which Miss Mortimer was holding on her way ; 
— the feeling that Miss Beecher's principles were 
true and her plans desirable, yet that the whole 
movement was in its incipiency and that the 
obstacles to its progress were almost mountain- 
high ; the financial embarrassments of the enter- 
prise ; the failure to secure the return of two of the 
teachers on whom she had leaned the previous 
year, and the confusion introduced at the very 
outset of the school year by the severe illness 
of several of the teachers ; the newness of the 
building and its unfurnished state, and the neces- 
sary absence, for much of the winter, of Mrs. Par- 
sons, the one associate who had been conversant 
from the beginning with the history, plans, and 
prospects of the school. 

We have seen in Mrs. Selleck-Rogers ' tribute to 
Miss Mortimer what she was as a teacher. What 
she was as a friend and a member of the household 
where she abode during this troublous time, we may 
learn from a paragraph in the oft-quoted ' ' Annals of 
Milwaukee College." 

"A picture of Miss Mortimer, in her home life with 
Judge Smith's family has been vividly preserved in the 
memory of those who were brought in contact with her 
cheerful domestic disposition. She was a great part 
of any household in which she abode, and upon her re- 
turn from harassing duties at school, was ever eager for 
the relaxation that brought rest. If the children were 



THE LIFE WORK. 1G1 

pre-occupied with their lessons, if Judge Smith was not 
at hand for the evening backgammon, then, in her 
quiet nook, . . . she chatted with those who were at 
leisure, or beguiled the time with her favorite peg-soli- 
taire. She was ready in its season for any romp or 
sport, especially if instruction were interwoven with the 
amusement. But she was also ready, when routine hour 
arrived, for the morning ride or trudge to school, and 
for the rigid discipline of the recurring day." 

The ideal home was to Miss Mortimer "all of 
Paradise that has survived the Fall." She had no 
expectation of reaching this ideal for herself, but 
she never failed to impress on her pupils that 
home-making was the highest achievement possible 
to women. This womanly ideal was the counter- 
part of her great-hearted, motherly nature, and the 
crown of all her teaching. 

The summer vacation of 1853 found Miss Morti- 
mer in Milwaukee, preparing to enter upon house- 
keeping for herself, one block from the College 
building. But the strain of the year previous was 
now making itself felt, mentally, spiritually, phys- 
ically. 

To Miss Thurston she writes : — 

" Milwaukee, June 19-July 6, 1853. 
" . . . The winter has passed away, and the summer, 
warm and oppressive, has come upon us. I have often 
felt myself full of cares and trials, and wished myself 
far away in some quiet nook where I might forget a 
world which I fear I love too little, but I am still strug- 
12 



162 MARY MORTIMER. 

gling on. ... I would rather stand on my own feet, 
and rely, under God, on myself, but Providence seems 
to have led me here, and Providence has not yet, I be- 
lieve, released me, so I must struggle on. . . . 

"I think our school will increase next term. I am 
thinking again quite strongly of taking a house — must 
decide soon. . . . Will you not come and see me set 
up as head of a family ? I have sundry misgivings in 
view of taking so high a position." 

To Miss Hill : — 

" Milwaukee, Oct. 23, 1853. 

". . . I was so worn out with being unsettled, that 
I determined if I must stay, that it should be a long 
stay. So here I am, settled in 'my family,' determined 
to fight and conquer. 

"I wish you were here. . . . Mrs. P. has returned in 
great strength and energy, and Mrs. W. is with us ; and 
Sister J. ; and Miss Mann, a niece of Horace Mann ; 
and Miss M. ; our school numbers over a hundred. 
Mr. P. writes encouragingly of the prospect in New 
York. Mrs. P. talks of going to Dubuque in the spring. 

I have one teacher and five pupils with me [in my 
home]. Housekeeping goes along pretty well." 

To Miss Thurston : — 

"Milwaukee, April 14, 1854. 
" . . . It seems to me sometimes of late that I have 
involved myself too much in what is distasteful to me ; 
but there is strength enough above, if we only lean upon 
it. . . . Mrs. P. is off to Dubuque next week. I be- 
lieve she is hoping much. The prospect looks fair. 



THE LIFE WORK. 163 

. . . We are just through our examination which passed 
off very well. We have dismissed three graduates. 
Next year we are likely to have a larger class. . . . 

"Our troubles are by no means over, yet I hope we 
shall go on with fewer trials after this." 

The ' * trials " referred to were doubtless chiefly 
financial, and in character such as beset most 
young educational enterprises. The loan on the 
College property, made in response to the plea of 
the teachers for furniture two or three years before, 
had accumulated interest, and there was no money 
with which to discharge the debt. This default in 
interest-payments matured the mortgage before the 
principal was due. 

The Association at the East had lost the endow- 
ment of $20,000 promised to the College, through 
the business failure of the gentleman who had sub- 
scribed it and paid the interest thereon for two 
years. This failure the Association found it difficult 
to make good, indeed only partially succeeded in 
doing so, and that after years of effort. As a con- 
sequence, the professional school (the Normal De- 
partment only having as yet a name) was kept in 
the background for lack of endowment. 

Mrs. Parsons, actively connected with the school 
from the beginning, had now taken her long antici- 
pated departure to inaugurate the second school on 
Miss Beecher's plan, at Dubuque, Iowa, and Miss 
Bradley, whose return to one of the departments 
had been confidently hoped for at Milwaukee, went 



1G4 MARY MORTIMER. 

instead to the aid of the new Iowa enterprise. Miss 
Mortimer trustfully turned in this emergency to 
Miss Hill, who, with health improved, gladly pre- 
pared to go to the assistance of her friend and of 
the school in whose prosperity she had become 
much interested through her connection with it in 
185 1-2. On the eve of setting out, sudden be- 
reavement in her family circle kept Miss Hill from 
Milwaukee, and Miss Mortimer " struggled on" as 
she had done in troublous times before, bearing 
heavy burdens, without the assistance she had ex- 
pected. 

To Miss Hill : — 

"Milwaukee, June 28, 1854. 

"I was made very happy on the reception of your 
letter with the assurance it gave me that you would re- 
turn to us at the beginning of next term. I have very 
little time to write, but must tell you I am looking for- 
ward with great hope and satisfaction to your coming. 
. . . Our next term commences about the middle of 
September. . . . 

"We use Smyth's Algebra and Trigonometry, — Bow- 
doin College books. . . . 

"Let me know if you wish to domicile with me. I 
believe that you told me you did." 

With an almost entire change of instructors ex- 
cept Miss Mortimer, Milwaukee College opened its 
fourth year on Sept. 20, 1854. 

Miss Mortimer was practically its chief executive, 
although she ever shrank from acknowledging the 



THE LIFE WORK. 1G5 

superiority of her position to that of her associates 
whom she desired in the full sense of the word to 
form with herself a "band of co-equal teachers." 
She was made glad by the return of Miss M. E. 
Hill, a tried friend and an accomplished teacher, 
and by the accession to the school of Miss S. E. 
Huntington, formerly of Canandaigua, N. Y. , who 
quickly became, and remained to the close of Miss 
Mortimer's life, her most intimate friend. 

In company with another friend, Miss Mortimer 
had previously purchased the modest house on the 
corner of Milwaukee and Knapp streets which had 
been her home since the summer of 1853. House- 
keeping brought its too heavy cares, in addition to 
the overwhelming burdens of the school, but it was 
"homelike," and this was a luxury for which Miss 
Mortimer's motherly heart was willing to pay dear. 

It was a pleasant home, and the family circle was 
just large enough and varied enough to be com- 
panionable and, to the extent of desirability, free 
and informal. The parlor opened to the right of 
the entrance hall, its piano, its books and pictures, 
its easy chairs inviting the presence of any member 
of the family when school duties gave leisure. On 
Saturday holidays and Sabbath holy days, on quiet 
afternoons and at the evening twilights, there was 
stirring discussion of the times, of the great names 
in the literary world, past and present, or low and 
quiet communings on the highest themes. Every 
evening at nine o'clock the family assembled for 



166 MARY MORTIMER. 

prayers, in which we were usually led by Miss 
Mortimer's earnest voice and where it often seemed 
that we could feel her very heart-throbs. 

Her own room, after a little shared by Miss 
Huntington, was on the opposite side of the hall, 
and back of both, the dining room where, usually 
to the number of six or eight, we gathered about 
the generous and home-like table, and the most 
stimulating and diverting talk, with many a witty 
sally and cheerful laugh, added piquancy to the 
viands. 

It was the earliest experience of the writer of 
these pages away from her father's roof, when she 
arrived at this home on the evening before the Col- 
lege year was to open. The journey had been a 
weary one and not without its mishaps, but at nine 
o'clock in the evening Miss Mortimer led the 
stranger to the cosy tea-table spread with whole- 
some and tempting food, and, apparently as free 
from care as a happy child, charmed away the 
strangeness and the incipient homesickness by her 
cheerful chat and homey ways. But it was easy 
to see that the absorbing object of Miss Mortimer's 
life was school, and only school. 

Just previous to the opening of the College year, 
proceedings to foreclose the mortgage on the edifice 
had been begun, and the College property was 
advertised for sale. 1 "This critical condition 
aroused citizens and Trustees to action. A public 

1 " Annals of Milwaukee College." 



THE LIFE WORK. 167 

meeting was called, eloquent speakers pictured the 
situation in graphic terms, and a subscription paper 
began its rounds and did not stop until more than 
eleven thousand dollars was subscribed. The mort- 
gage was paid in full, with a balance remaining in 
the treasury. 

Additional legislation during the winter of 1854-5 
enabled the Board of Trustees to issue stock, in 
shares of $25, each share entitling its possessor to 
one vote in the election of trustees, and the num- 
ber of the latter was increased to fifteen. 

In the spring Miss Mortimer writes that she finds 
herself "bereft of much of her early enthusiasm," 
but otherwise gives an excellent account. 

To Miss. T., under date of March 18, 1855 : — 

" Our matters here have come to a promising point, 
at last, still I cannot say that I feel much elated. Our 
school is confessedly the school of the city, with no op- 
position and no rivalry. , The sum of ten thousand 
dollars proposed to the citizens to be raised has been 
exceeded by the subscriptions. Our debts are paid, 
and I believe more than three thousand dollars are left 
in the treasury. This sum will, I suppose, be expended 
mainly in furnishing and improving the school prem- 
ises, and in increasing the library and apparatus. Miss 
Beecher made us a long visit in December and brought 
the matter to a crisis. We have a new Board of Trustees. 
. . . Our city is thriving for good, I trust, as well as 
getting more wealth and power. . . . Our school num- 
bers one hundred and fifty. You have heard that Miss 



168 MARY MORTIMER. 

Hill is with us, I presume. I have had a pleasant 
family, but since C. left me, I have concluded my cares 
are too many, and I am going to resign housekeeping 
at the close of the present term. . . . My health has 
been decidedly better than it used to be, but I feel 
worn, and am longing for rest." 

Miss Mortimer's needed rest she found in a meas- 
ure in her contemplated trip to the East in the 
summer and autumn of 1855. 

The late autumn finds Miss Mortimer visiting 
friends, at Lima, N. Y., whence she writes Mrs. 
John Mortimer : — 

"It is a beautiful Sabbath morning in that most 
beautiful of summers, — the Indian Summer. I am in a 
charming place to which I have taken quite a liking, 
and feel that I should be very grateful for so much 
beauty, — so much to lead me above the trials of our 
common life. Gentle, calm, enlightening, loving, like 
the words of Jesus, does this sunlight fall over the land- 
scape, over the fading foliage, more gorgeous in its de- 
cay than in its noontide glory. Among many lessons 
does it not whisper to us this, that we, too, should in- 
crease in glory and excellence as life wanes ? Are not 
the glories which are to be revealed growing nearer? 
And this light, — O ! what unutterable things it says of 
Him who is its Source. Why is it that we do not love 
Him more, and lose all anxiety, all desire for aught 
else, in this blessed conviction — 'I am His; He is 
mine ; and in Him I have all things ' ? 



THE LIFE WORK. 1G() 

"What matters it where He leads me, of what I am 
deprived? 'He doeth all things well/ and if His arm is 
about me, it is all-sufficient." 

The school went on prosperously, even in Miss 
Mortimer's temporary absence, so thoroughly was it 
organized and so capable and efficient were the 
teachers in charge of the different departments. 
For several years at this period, it numbered over two 
hundred and fifty, much the larger part of the pu- 
pils, however, belonging to the preparatory depart- 
ments. The number in the college classes was 
now about fifty. 

To Miss T. Miss Mortimer writes from — 

"Milwaukee, Jan. 13, 1856. 
"Miss Beecher has been here again, to make arrange- 
ments for building one of those famous cottages. She 
has the money for the building, but wants the people 
here to buy the land. They talk of doing so. Miss 
Beecher's system of exercise we have introduced into 
our school and feel quite interested in it and so do the 
pupils. I think it will be useful and hope as soon as the 
book, ' Physiology and Calisthenics ' is out, you will 
see it." 

The teachers addressed to the Trustees, in Feb- 
ruary 1856, a paper in which they refer to the con- 
dition and prospects of the school, and state that 
for the first time since its organization it can be 
reported that ' ' as regards the building and furni- 



170 MARY MORTIMER. 

ture the school is in comfortable and respectable 
circumstances," and that it "is believed to be in a 
more complete state of organization and subor- 
dination than are most female schools, even of the 
higher grade." 

With the prosperity of the school seemingly on a 
sure basis, and a considerable balance in the treas- 
ury, the Trustees and Miss Beecher conferred as to 
the best means of providing the home so much 
needed for teachers and pupils from a distance, and 
of developing at the same time, features of Miss 
Beecher's original plan for the Institution which 
financial stress had hitherto kept in the back- 
ground. Buildings for the health and domestic 
departments Miss Beecher felt were imperatively 
needed, and, with the department for the training 
of the mind already so well established, would fully 
complete her plan. 

Her intention was first, and immediately, to 
erect a cottage for the domestic department. ' ' It 
was to be a model of good taste in architectural 
proportion and finish, and yet be very economical. 
It was to be so arranged that the teachers should 
have the quiet and comfort of an independent 
home, should not be forced to have a room-mate 
unless congenial, and should not be crowded into a 
great family of boarding scholars. This cottage 
was to be connected with the school by a building 
for the health department " containing a hall for 
gymnastic exercises. 



CHAPTER V. 

REST AND CHANGE. 

This is not the place for a discussion of the 
merits of the controversy which arose about this 
time between the Educational Association as repre- 
sented by Miss Beecher, and the Trustees of the 
College. 

The difficulties of the enterprise during the earlier 
years were, naturally, mainly of a financial charac- 
ter. After this, they were chiefly differences be- 
tween the Trustees and the Association as regarded 
the carrying out of the original plan of the institu- 
tion ; and these differences, to Miss Mortimer, who 
from her position, stood between the two, were far 
more trying than the poverty and overwhelming 
labors of the earlier years. 

The success which the school had achieved, the 
high rank in instruction, scholarship and organiza- 
tion it had attained and maintained, the property 
of thirty thousand dollars it had accumulated within 
six years, amid all the stress and strain of society 
in a young city struggling for existence, its present 
income of more than four thousand dollars, over 
three fourths of which was from tuition, all at- 



172 MARY MORTIMER. 

tested alike the generosity of its friends and the 
severe and self-denying toil of its teachers. 

Miss Mortimer had never sought a part in this 
arduous undertaking, but had relinquished plans 
that were dear to her, because she believed that 
Providence pointed out a work for her here. Life 
in a city was not her ideal — her whole soul longed 
for the simpler, more unworldly life of the country. 
She believed that she might now safely leave the 
work here to other hands, and seek to carry out her 
ideals in other and more congenial surroundings. 
This thought, now that she had reached the point 
of middle life, mingled with her desire for a home 
which she felt she ought to be making for herself 
while strength remained to her, runs through her 
private correspondence in these years. 

The differences referred to were a sore trial to 
her and she sought withdrawal the more earnestly 
and thoughtfully on this account. 

To a pupil (S. M. B.) who had been withdrawn 
from school on account of bereavement and conse- 
quent family cares, Miss Mortimer wrote from — 

" Milwaukee, April, 22, 1856. 
". . . We should have been very glad to have held 
you here, but a wise Providence seemed to order it 
otherwise. I trust the school in which you have been 
placed since you were here has done as much to de- 
velop and form your character (which should be the 
aim of all education) as anything we could have done 
for you. ... 



THE LIFE WORK. 173 



"I have never intended to settle in Milwaukee, and 
hope to arrange something else before very long. Last 
week I went out of your city toward the west, and was 
more pleased with the place than I have ever been be- 
fore. If through your father or other friends you 
could give me any information in relation to land along 
the west bank of the river I should be glad." 

To Miss Hill, in the summer of 1856, on present- 
ing the "Life of Sterling : " — 

"Few things are so soul-cheering in the weary pil- 
grimage of life as the knowledge, brought home to one's 
heart, of the life and triumphs of genius and goodness. 
If the "Life of Sterling" shall do this for you, I shall 
have gained my point, which was to afford you a joy- 
ful association with your absent friend, and to tell you 
something of what you have been to her. 

"That the best blessings may go with you wherever 
you go, is the prayer of 

"Yours in the truest attention and confidence, 

" M. Mortimer." 
To Miss T. : — 

"Milwaukee, Sept. 7, 1856. 
"... Every day's reflection deepens my conviction 
that we should labor in some capacity to the extent of 
our ability, because thus alone can we develop our- 
selves and bless the world, but, as we injure our own 
development and unfit ourselves to bless others by over- 
work, it is equally our duty not to overwork. Whatever 
might have been your duty in regard to the term open- 
ing before you when you wrote, there can be no doubt, 
it seems to me, that you should be arranging your af- 



174 MARY MORTIMER. 

fairs as speedily as possible, to relieve yourself from so 
much care and labor as you must have while in charge 
of such a school as yours. 

" I find my loss of freshness, of vigor and enthusiasm 
in the daily routine of teaching, a reason for changing 
my manner of life, for I cannot bear to bring less than 
these to my noble work, than in my earlier life. Yet my 
health is much better than when I taught with you. 

"I should think you would experience the same 
[weariness] but I do not know that you do. At all 
events I wish that in your present condition your nerves 
could rest, but I can do nothing in the matter that I 
see. I. wish I could. My grateful desire to make 
some return to your declining years for the good you 
have done me, has never abated. 

"God grant I may yet be able to prove my grati- 
tude to you, my oldest and best friend. 

". . . May I urge you, for the winter before you, if 
still you go on as you have done, to begin your term by 
a fair and wise division of responsibility as well as of 
labor, — such a division as will relieve you, except from 
a general and not laborious oversight. We do it here. 
Each teacher considers herself responsible for her de- 
partment ; but it had to be put upon them at first. 

" I am hoping to withdraw myself, perhaps by de- 
grees, from school, during the next six months or year. 
Several teachers we have lost, among them, Miss Hill, 
but her aunt takes her place, and other teachers of 
character and experience are engaged, and enough so 
that I think there will not be much need of me. I am 
hoping to do some studying this winter." 



THE LIFE WORK. 175 

To Miss M. E. Hill : — 

"Phelps, N. Y., Feb. 17, 1857. 

"I have actually left Milwaukee. . . . All things 
were going on prosperously in school. There has been 
much religious interest of late in the school, and in sev- 
eral of the churches. I trust it is deep and true. Your 
aunt [Miss Sarah B. Hill] proves herself a most efficient 
and valuable teacher, but I fear she has found her situa- 
tion quite uncomfortable. She has suffered, as we all 
have, on account of the difficulty of getting board, and 
I suspect it is a little harder for her to bear. I hope 
things in this direction will improve, but you know I 
have hoped long. Miss H. and myself have been very 
pleasantly situated at Mrs. M.'s. I have rather run 
away, — I could not seem to get away otherwise. I am 
away "on trial," hoping to get released, but not 
knowing. 

"To you and to Miss B., I wrote from a full heart, 
but not a word of reply have I received. Nevertheless, 
you have both been to me faithful and true helpers and 
friends, and my heart will always throb with affection 
and gratitude as I think of you. I have, too, to thank 
you for a shining 'jet' incased in gold, for which, Miss 
H. told me, I am chiefly indebted to you. It is beau- 
tiful in itself, and still more so to me, as your and her 
gift. Pearls and gold I have not been given very much 
to prizing, but One infinitely wiser than I has used 
them as emblematical of the highest beauty and joy, 
and I trust I have the power so to regard them. 

"Believe me, my once dear pupil, my still very dear 
friend, anything from you will be emblematical of love 
and truth. ..." 



17G MARY MORTIMER. 

To the same : — 

"Auburn, March 7, 1857. 

"I think now, if I stay so long, I should like to go 
to Lima to the Commencement, which occurs June 25, 
and I have engaged a room for us at that time. . . . 
The news from Milwaukee is good. I met Mr. and 
Mrs. P. on the train, on the way to Lima, and went on 
to Le Roy with them. They have about seven thou- 
sand dollars engaged [on the endowment of the 
College]." 

To the same : — 

"Phelps, April 12, 1857. 

' ' I am trying to keep cheerful, as one of the virtues 
I need especially to exercise, but the longing to think, 
to work out thought, to learn the thoughts of the wise, 
to be getting that long-wished-forhome, will rise in my 
heart. And yet, what matters it? Our Father, when 
it pleases Him, can give us more wisdom than the 
wisest have, — and with all our efforts we can get only 
the shadow of a home, — the real one being above. My 
future lies all uncertain before me. I have settled 
nothing, can settle nothing yet, as I see." 

To Miss S. B. Hill : — 

"Phelps, April 14, 1857. 
"Your letter of March 17 reached me in due time, 
informing me of your departure from Milwaukee and 
the sad reason. Many lamentations on account of your 
departure have reached me, still I think it was quite 
right that you should go, and I hope your visit, what- 



THE LIFE WORK. 177 



ever may be its termination, will afford you some satis- 
faction. I scarcely know how to write this morning, 
for I have not a glimmer of intelligence as to how you 
found your sister. It seems not likely that she can be 
alive. Whatever may be your circumstances, however, 
you know where to look for comfort and guidance, and 
I gratefully leave you and yours in His hands 'who 
doeth all things well,' and maketh ' all things work for 
good to them who love him.' 

" My head continues to trouble me quite seriously. I 
do not know what to do with it, — believe there is noth- 
ing but to stop thinking and feeling. 

" I shall never lose my interest in Milwaukee College, 
and, still less, in female education, to which I long ago 
desired to dedicate my life. I have no wish or thought 
of changing that dedication. The only question is how 
I can best effect it. I hope I shall be able to decide 
upon my future course before long. 

"Miss M. E. Hill will be gladly accepted as your 
substitute if one must be had, for it is seldom we can 
find so desirable a teacher as she. However, you will 
of course arrange this with the teachers on the ground. 
They were getting very anxious, I thought, last week, 
when I learned that they had not yet heard from you. 
The examination had commenced well, and all things 
were getting on very well, I gather from Miss H.'s let- 
ters, and from those of several young ladies who have 
written me." 

To Miss Thurston : — 

"Milwaukee, Aug. 4, 1857. 
"I reached here in safety, found Miss H. better, and 
things quite in shape for me to leave, as I have so 
13 



1 78 MAR Y A/OR TIMER. 

long desired. We expect to set out for the East to- 
morrow. . . . Sometime next month I think we shall 
both make you a visit, and perhaps I will stay with you 
right along then. 

I will take your school on the terms we talked over. 
. . . Tell me, if any of the teachers wish to leave ; if 
anything has occurred, or is likely to occur, to change 
your plans." 

To S. M. B.: — 

"Lima, N. Y., Aug. 10, 1857. 

"Since your letter was written, I have been to Milwau- 
kee and returned to this place, therefore did not receive 
yours till two or three days since, when I was tired, 
travel-stained, and absorbed with seeing friends. I em- 
brace the opportunity to thank you, and to answer 
your questions. 

" I have bidden adieu to Milwaukee, and, for the next 
year, at least, expect to be at Elmira in this State, in 
charge of the Female Seminary there. This is a tem- 
porary engagement, for the sake of obliging my friend, 
Miss Thurston, who owns this Seminary, and to occupy 
myself till I can settle more definitely than my circum- 
stances at present will allow." 

Somewhat more than a year was passed by Miss 
Mortimer in charge of the school of her friend in 
Elmira, during which she had the satisfaction of 
affording Miss Thurston opportunity for complete 
and much-needed rest, and of discharging in part, 
the debt of gratitude she felt to the always loved 
and revered teacher of her girlhood days of doubt 



THE LIFE WORK. 179 

and weakness. This period in Elmira, though not 
a settled one, was one of comparative freedom from 
obligations to a wide public, east and west, under 
which Miss Mortimer had labored at Milwaukee, 
and she much enjoyed, in many respects, the rela- 
tion which she sustained to her Elmira pupils. 
Over and above the rest and pleasure brought to 
her by this change, was the friendship she there 
formed with the Rev. Thomas K. Beecher, pastor 
of the Congregational Church. Thenceforth to 
the end of Miss Mortimer's life, she much prized 
the public utterances and the private friendship of 
Mr. Beecher, and none who heard her quotations 
from his sermons, his conversation and his letters, 
could doubt the inspiration they brought her. 

Many requests for her services in educational 
work came to Miss Mortimer during these months, 
for she had become widely known. From the 
East, from the South, from the West came invita- 
tions, but, although comparatively refreshed by her 
year's change of scene and environment, and under 
heavy pecuniary obligations which she had most 
generously and unselfishly assumed for the good of 
others, and which made her feel that she ought to 
lose no time in settling again to her chosen work, 
experience had rendered her cautious, and it was 
not until some months later that she at last, after 
much prayer and deliberation, decided upon a 
location. 



180 MARY MORTIMER. 

In the autumn of 1858, Miss Mortimer wrote : — 

"A number of situations have offered, but like all 
things in this world, to each of them there has been an 
objection. To Milwaukee, from which came an appli- 
cation [to return] the old objections existed. 

" I have had a long letter from 'the Executive Com- 
mittee of Baraboo Seminary/ notifying me of my 
appointment to the Principalship of the same, and con- 
taining a sheet full of argument, under five heads, why 
this is a desirable post , but alas ! I dread publicity, 
and corporations." 

"Boston, Nov., 1858. 

" I am unsettled, and wish this winter to decide 
upon something if possible. ... I have a pressing 
application from Wisconsin, which must be an- 
swered soon. Miss Thurston also wishes me to take 
her school. . . . 

"I am spending some weeks with Miss H. in this 
city." 

To the Elmira School : — 

"Boston, Nov. 15, 1858. 

[After describing her journey by way of New York, 
Long Island Sound, and Fall River to Boston.] 

" The hubbub and noise and struggle of New York 
are so disagreeable to me that I always feel a groan 
of distress rising within me whenever I come in 
sight of this great city, and yet, there are great things 
and good all the time rising up out of the din and 
bustle. . . . 

" I have sat down and felt at rest, of which some of 



THE LIFE WORK 181 



you, I am sure, will be glad, for life is a troubled scene, 
a time of labor and care, and an interlude of rest is 
good. Of course I have not seen much yet. We went 
to the Public Library on Saturday, and I was delighted 
to find a large, beautiful building, fitted up with all 
sorts of conveniences for reading and writing. One 
elegant room furnished with arm chairs and round 
tables is assigned to ladies, and I was already dreaming 
about spending pleasant hours there, looking at books 
I cannot get in the country, when I was informed that 
the library had but lately removed into this, its future 
pleasant and elegant home, and was not yet properly 
arranged, and books could not be drawn for a month 
yet. So disappointments come, — but the delightful 
fact remains that this valuable library in its spacious 
and beautiful halls is to be thrown open, free of charge, 
to all well-behaved citizens of Boston, and here all who 
can get the time may come and make acquaintance with 
the wisest and best of many nations and ages. I could 
but think what a blessing to you and your town would 
be such a fountain of wisdom among you ; and even 
there, standing as I was in such a hall, massive and 
splendid in architecture, I believed what I have told 
some of you, that you might make for yourselves a 
small fountain, which gradually drawing to itself many 
little streams, would by and by grow to be large, and 
a blessing to thousands. 

" I went twice to church yesterday, and heard two 
Boston celebrities, but hardly felt the privilege greater 
than I enjoy in your town, — still they were fine ser- 
mons." 

To Elmira pupils : — 



182 MARY MORTIMER. 

"Boston, Nov. 27, 1858. 

[After a humorous address to the younger girls]. 

" I have spent some time since I have been here 
in looking at pictures and statuary, and wish I could 
tell you about them as I cannot. As I looked, and 
the spirit of beauty seemed to peep out upon me, I 
thought of you and others, and longed that to you that 
spirit might come in full measure, inspiring you with 
beautiful thoughts, affections, and impulses. Let me 
urge you, dear children, to look at something beautiful 
every day, — so look that you shall drink in something 
of its beauty. You can always do this, for all that God 
has made is beautiful, the sky above you, the earth be- 
neath, the hills around, with their ever-changing hues 
and shadows. 

"On Saturday we went to see the Bunyan Tableaux. 
Probably you have seen or will see them, and I will not 
stop to describe them, — but only tell you to go and see 
them if you have an opportunity. 

"Finally, dear children, you know those wishes and 
charges which parents and teachers give you so often 
that you weary of them. I shall not need to repeat 
them, but do not forget, you need to think of them 
every hour." 

To Miss T. : — 

"Boston, Nov. 27, 1858. 

"I have just heard a very fine sermon. . . . 

" Slavery on the one hand, freedom on the other, 
were beautifully set forth. More and more, I believe 
as we progress in our Christian life, shall we rise into 
freedom, the freedom of love, so that the time shall 



THE LIFE WORK. 183 

come when we shall no longer refrain from evil through 
fear and obey God from a sense of duty ; but we shall 
rise above fear, and still more, above duty, above law, 
— love shall be all and in all, and then life, even here, 
shall be blessed, clouds shall be light to us, . . . pain 
shall become pleasure, for it shall be borne for Him. 
. . . How strange and inconsistent it is of us that we 
do not trust and be at rest always. It is one of the 
heaviest things, I believe, that will rise against us in the 
great day of accounts, that in the face of all that has been 
done for us, in the face of our knowledge and profes- 
sion, we yet go on our way doubting, fearing, anxious, 
cast down. How, in view of all, ought we to rejoice, to 
overflow with peace and gratitude. It seems to me I 
will arise and put on the garments of praise, and mourn 
no more. . . . 

" The letter which you forwarded . . . was full of 
arguments and entreaties that I should go to B. An- 
other letter from my Milwaukee pastor has come, too, 
with the ' volume of arguments,' and offering himself to 
look over the ground with me, — and lastly, they have 
all decided it is my solemn duty to go, etc." 

To Miss T. : — 

"Boston, Dec. i, 1858. 

"... I feel encouraged by the offer at Baraboo, and 

by S. C.'s advocacy of it, so that I am more willing to 

try it than when I left you. Still I am not decided. 

... I think I shall have to say \ yea ' or « nay ' in the 

course of two weeks. I shall probably agree to go there 

about the first of February, if at all. ... I feel that I 

must decide soon and act vigorously on my future 

course." 



184 MARY MORTIMER. 

Other projects were open to Miss Mortimer, her 
family friends were east of the Great Lakes, and 
worn with the toil of the Milwaukee enterprise, it is 
not strange that she hesitated before undertaking 
another new and unendowed school. 

She wrote from — 

"Boston, Dec. 10, 1858. 
"I shrink, for more than my own sake, from taking 
that irrevocable step of writing, I zvill go to Baraboo. . . . 
As another urgent letter came, I have answered, saying 
I would decide in a week or ten days. ... I can hesi- 
tate no longer. I am very desirous to so settle this 
matter with you and some others that we shall not re- 
gret the step I take. The Baraboo enterprise looks 
hopeful to me and interesting, — even Miss H. is im- 
pressed that I would better go, — still I have a shrink- 
ing sometimes. We are weak creatures are we not? 
May God give us the simple trust in Him that shall be 
better than all earthly wisdom. . . I have had a whole 
package of letters from the Milwaukee girls this week." 

" Boston, Dec. 18. 

"... I write to-day that, on conditions which I 
presume will be accepted, I will go to Baraboo, subject 
to this proviso, that if things do not look promising 
when I get there, I may retreat if I choose. I do not 
dread the labor very much — I must work and it is 
best. I am anxious about you, and wish I could help 
you . . . but see not what to do. As you say, it is 
brighter beyond. God bless you, my dear friend, and 
guide you. . . . 

"I shall not go West before February." 



THE LIFE WORK. 185 

To the Elmira School : — 

" Last week was Thanksgiving, and I heard a beauti- 
ful sermon which thrilled me with hope and gladness. 
< Our Father,' the preacher said, Ms too great to need 
to look at us in masses. He knows us each one ; 
treasures each tear from each eye, knows each smile of 
each child ; long ages ago planned each little flower to 
grow that it might bless you and me,' and he urged us, 
at the close, to single out some one blessing and look 
back and see through what a process of preparation it 
had come to us, and be thankful for it. Immediately 
my heart said, 'I will be thankful for this sermon."' 

To the Young Ladies at Elmira : — 

" Boston, Dec. 18, 1858. 
". . . Since I wrote last I have been through the 
Custom House, — a fine fire-proof building which cost 
more than a million dollars. We went, also, over the 
State House, which, in some parts, is quite quaint and 
curious, and from the top we 'viewed the landscape 
o'er.' It was a fine view of sea and land, interspersed 
with sails, masts, brick walls, and trees, but even while 
I gazed on that fine prospect, as my eye fell on the 
brick walls, high and crowded with their steep, sharp 
roofs just below me, I was thankful that it would still 
probably be my lot to live where the pure air of heaven 
and the glorious canopy above could bless me, as it 
cannot the dwellers in these narrow streets, some of 
which are scarcely wider than a carriage. Still, I like 
Boston, considering that it is a large city. It is very 
clean and orderly, and one therefore feels great comfort 
and security in going about. 



186 MARY MORTIMER. 

" Tuesday evening we had a very Emersonian lecture 
from Mr. R. W. Emerson himself upon Fate. ... It 
represented nature as an immense wheel forever revolv- 
ing on its destined course, unheeding the good or the 
harm it might do us, and we, taken along with it, in a 
great degree powerless, resistless. But as nature is 
circumstance which must come, so we, with free will, 
are power to overcome. A fine illustration Mr. Emer- 
son gave us in steam, which ages ago was found to be 
so great a force that every pot and kettle had to be 
made with a hole in the top to let the steam escape in 
order to save explosion and destruction. But by and 
by, Watt and Fulton and others began to ask if this 
force could not be used to overcome space and time 
and gravitation and cohesion, and so man conquered 
nature by turning it against itself. ... I will add, 
about the lecture only this, — it had no Father above 
who controls all the destines, numbers even the hairs of 
our heads, and allows not even a sparrow to fall to the 
ground without His notice. ... I thought how much 
better and brighter and dearer was that Thanksgiving 
sermon of which I wrote in my last. Yesterday, we 
went to the Athenaeum, and saw some fine pictures and 
statues. I am not an artist, you know, and so cannot 
tell you much about them, but I found it very delight- 
ful to look at some of them. I hope you will have the 
same privilege some day, and will so improve your op- 
portunities now, that when the time comes for seeing 
and hearing the great things, you will have eyes to see 
with, and ears to hear with. 

" Last evening I heard Mr. Everett lecture. It hardly 
becomes me to offer an opinion upon a gentleman of so 



THE LIFE WORK. 187 

wide and settled fame as his, but since I live, just now, 
so near the ' Cradle of Freedom ' perhaps I may be per- 
mitted to say that I have heard speakers who thrilled 
me far more. Of course Mr. Everett is graceful, schol- 
arly, eloquent, and all that, and gave a fine eulogy on 
his friend, . . . and fine and beautiful sentiments, but 
not like some men did he thrill his hearers with new 
and burning truths, or with old truths brought forth 
into so clear a light that the hearer must see and feel 
too. ..." 



CHAPTER VI. 

BARABOO FEMALE SEMINARY. 

No part of Miss Mortimer's career gave her more 
pleasure than the years she spent in Baraboo. 

At the time when she was so unexpectedly invited 
to take charge of the school there by the Synod of 
Wisconsin, it had been in operation for nearly two 
years, but the time had come when the interest felt 
for it was to crystallize in new and larger plans for 
its future. The town, about one hundred miles 
west of Milwaukee, bears the Indian name of the 
river on which it is situated, a large and beautiful 
stream, which, now loitering, now tumbling in haste 
over huge rocks, now winding between wooded 
bluffs dotted with Indian mounds, now stealing in 
shadow between towering cliffs at the ''Narrows, " 
now circling and eddying about the giant water- 
wheel of a ruined and isolated mill, now whirling 
through "The Skillet," a well which its own waters 
had worn in the solid rock, and now dimpling and 
laughing past "The Pewit's Nest," — a cove of its 
own creation, — was everywhere "a joy forever " 
as it hastened to its junction with the wide and 
majestic Wisconsin, not many miles away. A spur 
of the Laurentian Hills, a true mountain range, 

[188] 



THE LIFE WORK. 189 

geologically the oldest land in North America, loses 
itself in peculiar formations of bold and picturesque 
bluffs which give to the horizon of Sauk Prairie, vis- 
ible from some portions of the town, a unique and 
fascinating outline. But the most weird and attract- 
ive feature of this wondrously beautiful region is 
known as "Devil's Lake," an irregular body of 
water half a league in length, half a mile in width, 
and in places of great depth, lying in a rift of rocks 
piled in gigantic confusion hundreds of feet in al- 
most perpendicular height on the eastern and west- 
ern shores of the lake, where evergreen and other 
trees have taken root and stand like sentinels gaz- 
ing on the Titanic proofs of past convulsions of nat- 
ure. At the northern entrance to this wonderful 
gorge, the family of an English gentleman was do- 
mesticated in a beautiful cottage on a lovely lawn 
beside the water ; at its southeastern termination, 
reached by boat along the water's sinuous length, 
was a cultivated fruit-farm; with a huge ' ' serpent- 
mound " and other animal forms thrown up by the 
aborigines near the beach. 

This rare spot was otherwise unmarked by man, 
its coy delights unsullied by the smoke and un- 
broken by the screech of the locomotive, and un- 
touched by the advent of the summer visitor, and 
for years afterward no railroad penetrated this 
romantic region to within a nearer distance than 
ten or twelve miles. 

The village, two or three miles from the lake, was 



190 MARY MORTIMER. 

the county seat, with a population at that time of 
about fifteen hundred intelligent and enterprising 
people, but a young community, and not homo- 
geneous in its composition. 

Though unsettled, Miss Mortimer hesitated long 
and painfully before consenting to take the charge 
of the school here which was urged upon her in 
the autumn of 1858 while in Elmira, and later in 
Boston. She was devoted to an ideal of feminine 
education which should be first of all Christian, 
but a school under the management of any denom- 
ination of Christians, even that one with which her 
lot had been cast and to which she was ever loyal, 
was not to her mind. 

But the arguments and entreaties of many 
friends of the plan, with the assurance that nothing 
should stand in the way of her entire freedom in 
the maintenance of an unsectarian school, that its 
church connection should be wholly for help and 
not for hindrance, together with the attractions of 
the country, and her own longing to be at work, 
combined at last to overcome her scruples and led 
her to undertake the precarious work of building up 
an unendowed school. 

This project was beset with even greater diffi- 
culties than those which generally encumber an 
educational undertaking in its infancy. Miss Morti- 
mer's early letters after her arrival speak of greater 
financial weakness than she expected, and of diffi- 
culties in the way which, to most persons, would 



THE LIFE WORK. 191 

have seemed formidable enough. But, like the in- 
visible part of an iceberg, much the larger portion 
of the troubles in store for the new venture were 
hidden below the surface of the great ocean of the 
future. 

It was early in the year 1859 that Miss Mortimer 
arrived upon the scene, but she was not committed 
to remain unless she should choose to do so when 
she should have had opportunity to look at the 
conditions face to face. 

Her journey from Boston to Baraboo was begun 
in January and completed in February, but as to 
time, and the comforts of travel, was in favorable 
contrast to her first journey from Western New 
York to the West by the upper lakes, little more 
than ten years before. 

The summer of this year is memorable for finan- 
cial troubles which undermined many a fair social 
fabric and ruined many a prosperous business. It 
was the year too, which was fraught with issues too 
vast for human forecast in connection with the 
coming conflict for the life of the Union. The 
President of the Board of Trustees of the Baraboo 
Female Seminary and many of its nearest friends 
were Virginians in training and in feeling, although 
they did not approve of slavery, and had removed 
to the North on this account. But when the John 
Brown raid at Harper's Ferry had excited public 
feeling, and the mutterings of coming thunderbolts 
began to be heard in the approach of the storm- 



192 MARY MORTIMER. 



cloud of Civil War, these devoted friends of the 
school sympathized to some extent with their old 
friends and neighbors in the South, and the flash- 
ing up of Northern feeling two years later in favor 
of "war to the knife and the knife to the hilt," did 
not tend to harmonize and promote the interests of 
the new school. Still, such was the power over its 
pupils and friends which Miss Mortimer began to 
exercise as soon as she became known in the school 
and the community, and such the good sense and 
influence of its chief supporters, that, amid the ex- 
citements and failures of the eventful years of 
1859-61 the frail bark rode onward over rough 
seas and did excellent service. 

As though these trials in the nation and the com- 
munity were not enough, the furnace of trouble was 
heated seven-fold by threatened dangers to Miss 
Mortimer's nearest friends. In the midst of- prepa- 
rations to enter upon new housekeeping for the 
school home, and all the distractions of the year of 
Mr. Lincoln's first election to the presidency, and 
the consequent secession of the Southern States, a 
fatal disease was threatening the life of the idolized 
sister who for many years had held almost a moth- 
er's place in her affections. Soon, at the summons 
of this sister, she flies from the midst of distracting 
cares and anxieties for the school to New York, to 
be her stay and help in that agonizing period of 
uncertainty and of struggle for life which charac- 
terizes the onset of disease usually fatal, but from 



THE LIFE WORK. 193 



which there is still a possibility of escape. There 
she met another sister, disabled by disease of the 
eyes, and took both to the Geneva Sanitarium, 
where, for weeks, improvement in the case of 
either was scarcely perceptible ; while her eldest 
and only remaining sister was at her home not far 
away in a state of hopeless invalidism. 

Miss Mortimer's most intimate friend was watch- 
ing beside an invalid brother in Boston, and 
thither, when she can be spared for a little from 
the side of her sisters in Geneva, she goes to ad- 
minister help and sympathy, and to receive into her 
own devoted heart the comfort of doing so. 

Returning from these vacation trips to the open- 
ing of her second full school year in Baraboo, she 
leaves her sisters no better, and takes up the 
double cares of school and household, with young 
assistants in the school, and without the sis- 
ter on whose fidelity in the charge of the house- 
hold she had expected to Jean. 

Nowhere does the grandeur of her character bet- 
ter appear than in this heated furnace of trial. A 
figure like unto the Son of Man walked beside her. 
The smell of fire did not cling to her garments, but 
its brightness illumined her character, and that 
companionship divine inspired her life. Even be- 
yond her wont, she was radiant before her pupils in 
that ever-to-be-remembered year. As the furnace- 
fires rose higher, her spirit grew strangely luminous, 
and there seemed supernal power to rest upon her. 

14 



194 MARY MORTIMER. 

As one State after another severed its connection 
with the Union, and men's hearts were failing them 
for fear, Miss Mortimer's heart was crushed by the 
sorrow of her idolized sister's hopeless illness at 
Geneva. In the winter vacation she again took the 
long journey eastward, that she might say a last 
farewell. 

She returned, to send the sister now with her to 
the aid of the dying sister in New York; to face 
the gloomy prospect as to school and country, and 
to graduate her first class in Baraboo, two of whom 
were former pupils in Milwaukee College who had 
followed her hither, and four of whom were among 
the most promising of the early pupils she gathered 
around her here. 

Miss Mortimer brought to her work at Baraboo 
the full maturity of her powers, enriched by her ex- 
perience of twenty years as a teacher, nearly ten of 
which had passed since the beginning of her ac- 
quaintance with Miss Beecher, and her mastery of 
the principles and details of Miss Beecher's remark- 
able work as an educator. Intensely original as 
she was, her humility and docility yet enabled her 
to graft upon her own ideals every good and fruitful 
scion which opportunity brought her, and to test 
everything by practical experiment. The course of 
study which was instituted at Baraboo was essen- 
tially the same as that at Milwaukee College, and 
what may be said of one was equally true of the 
other, — while Miss Mortimer herself was one of the 



THE LIFE WORK. 195 

chief features of each. The grade of teaching was 
of the very best, its principles were deep laid, its 
methods unique, and successful in arousing in pupils 
the highest enthusiasm in study and the deepest af- 
fection for teachers, and a quiet, but strong religious 
impulse was given to many lives. The Bible was, 
from the first, made a text-book, and studied thor- 
oughly by all pupils in classes adapted to their 
advancement, throughout the preparatory and colle- 
giate courses. 

History was taught in a five years' course begin- 
ning in the Preparatory Department, philosophic- 
ally, in the later years, and always with a depth and 
comprehensiveness which the writer has never 
seen equaled, nor even approached, elsewhere. In 
Metaphysics, as in History, Miss Mortimer was the 
chief teacher, and it was hard to tell in which de- 
partment pupils caught most of the enthusiasm and 
inspiration of their gifted leader. The evidences 
of Christianity were taught by Miss Mortimer on a 
most comprehensive scale. It was her custom to 
deliver a series of lectures which she called " Truth 
Lessons " to her classes in the last term of the 
school year preceding their entrance on senior 
studies. The lectures were from eight to twelve in 
number, beginning with the question ''What is 
Truth, " and taking up successively, "The Difficul- 
ties of the Subject," " Man a Truth Seeker," "The 
Common Ground," " Guidance for the Search," 
" The Great First Cause," "Religion the Highest 



196 MARY MORTIMER. 

Truth, and Man a Religious Being," and a defini- 
tion of the line along which man's "Search" 
must progress. 

This was, first, Human Consciousness. At this 
point a text-book in Mental Science was introduced, 
at the beginning of the Senior Year, with much 
collateral reading, which indeed had been begun in 
connection with the previous Truth Lessons. 
Schlegel's "Philosophy of History," Mrs. Child's 
"Progress of Religious Ideas," and Plato's Socratic 
Dialogues were daily companions of the class, in 
study, library, and class-room, while a great number 
of other works frequently threw side lights on the 
subject. Hickok, Mansell, Sir William Hamilton, 
were favorites with one part of the class, and the 
chief lights of the opposite school in Metaphysics 
supported the opinions of the other portion, while 
they paused in the search for truth in human con- 
sciousness in a thorough study of Mental and Moral 
Science. The search in physical nature took up 
the study of Natural Theology, and daily recitations 
for many weeks in these three lines of "search" 
were as thorough and accurate as though there were 
no larger scheme of training of which these studies 
were but a part. 

From the Search in Nature, and individual Con- 
sciousness, the students turned to History, or Uni- 
versal Consciousness, where in this class they were 
led to find, as the most important phase of history, 
Systems of Religion. In the study of the Chinese, 



THE LIFE WORK. 197 

Indian, Egyptian, Persian, Grecian and Roman, 
Hebrew and Christian Systems, they were taught 
to ask what questions men in all ages had most 
anxiously pondered. These were found to be, God 
and our relations to Him, the Future Life, Rewards 
and Punishments, Origin of Evil, Sacred Books, 
Modes of Worship. The Class took up Butler's 
Analogy of Natural and Revealed Religion in rela- 
tion to the first four of these topics. Nowhere did 
Miss Mortimer's peculiar power as an educator 
more fully show itself than in the enthusiasm she 
would arouse in the study of this difficult book, and 
the power which it exerted, under her guidance, on 
the minds and hearts of her pupils, extending, with 
many of them, through a lifetime. 

" Bishop Butler," says Matthew Arnold, 1 " was, 
on the whole, the man of greatest intellectual 
power in the Church of England during the eight- 
eenth century. His Analogy has lost popularity not 
because of any discovered weakness in its contents, 
but simply because of the shifting of the grounds of 
unbelief. " 

4 ' The book demands and repays attentive study. 
... It has long been a text book in our colleges, 
and may retain its place still longer. But even if 
it ceases to be thus used, it will always be a quarry 
whence apologists can derive arguments, a discipline 
by which mental strength can be increased." 2 

1 " Essays on Church and Religion," 1877. 
3 " Schaff-Herzog." 



198 MARY MORTIMER. 

It was both as a means of strengthening belief in 
the probability of revealed religion, and as a men- 
tal discipline, that Miss Mortimer wielded this pow- 
erful book, and there are .passages in it which some 
of her pupils can never read without deep emotion, 
as they recall her clear vision and fervid feeling of 
the truths they impressed. 

But this unique " Search for Truth" was not yet 
closed. For its completion, the closing weeks of 
the Senior year were given to a brief study of tech- 
nical "Evidences of Christianity," and " Church 
History " that answers might be found relating to 
' 'Sacred Books" and " Modes of Worship" in the 
Christian Religion. 

The oral examination conducted by Miss Morti- 
mer over this whole ground sufficed to bring to the 
Anniversaries, from far and near, gentlemen from 
all the professions, as well as many non-profession- 
als of sound mind, and a crowd of interested friends 
and listeners. 

"The best teaching of my life," she said, not 
long before her death, to a member of the first class 
of Baraboo Seminary, " I did with your class." A 
clergyman writing of the examination of this class, 
which was different in no important aspect from 
that of all her Milwaukee and Baraboo "Truth 
Classes," said ; "It was not simply the repetition 
of views set forth in one text-book, but the broad 
field of truth was ranged over. No distinction was 
made with reference to any one religion as having 



THE LIFE WORK. 199 

peculiar claims upon man in view of its origin and 
authority ; but the various systems were examined 
and sifted as to their intrinsic merits, their solution 
of the questions of the human mind, and their 
adaptation to the wants of man, — and that the 
Christian religion most fully met these requisites 
seemed very conclusive. . . . Any one listening 
attentively to the lucid statements, the searching 
analysis of all the conclusions accepted, could not 
but believe that had all our youth passed through 
such a discipline, walked with such a teacher 
through the field of Truth, there would be little 
danger of their being led hither and thither by 
crude notions in religion, — we should not have so 
many hobbling after every shallow novelty of the 
day. " 

The first circular issued at Baraboo, and the 
Seminary Catalogue of 1 86 1-2, give the ripened 
convictions of Miss Mortimer as an educator : — 

"We believe that the course of God in the great 
world-school in which all are pupils, as this course is 
revealed in nature, in history and in human conscious- 
ness, is the proper model for any school. 

"We believe this course to be an opening, developing 
process, exciting the learner first to bodily activity, to 
the exercise of the senses and powers of observation ; 
then a gradual leading of the mind from the outer and 
sensuous to the inner and spiritual, from details to 
principles, from the exercise of the senses and memory 
to that of reflection, reason and conscience, — thus in- 



200 MARY MORTIMER. 

volving the education, not of the intellect alone, but of 
the whole being, and giving to the faithful student 
himself, in the full light of consciousness, and with full 
power of self-control. 

"We believe the course of nature shows that the 
leading business of a teacher is not so much to impart 
knowledge as to prepare the mind for its reception; 
that knowledge is the. means, rather than the end of 
education. The details of science will fade from the 
memory in later life and in the infinite future ; none the 
less, nature designs them to be, and the wise teacher 
will make them, a double treasure. By their aid he 
shall so develop and strengthen the power of his pupils 
that they can gain noble and beautiful characters, and 
the sciences shall become to them indices of truth — 
the proper object of human life and effort, the food 
of the spirit, the light of the universe. 

"We believe, further, that in the course of nature, 
man is the central object, the connecting link between 
the visible and invisible creation, exhibiting in himself 
the connections of science as no other object does, con- 
nections which are so intimate that even a child has 
glimpses of all. While, then, if time and circumstance 
will allow, no study should be overlooked or neglected, 
it would seem that the science of humanity ought to be 
especially prominent. 

"We believe that nature shows the special vocation 
of woman to be that of an educator and a homemaker; 
that her necessities, as regards discipline are the same 
as those of the other sex, but as regards knowledge they 
are somewhat different, and as nature varies her gifts to 
each created thing according to its necessities, so the 



THE LIFE WORK. 201 

knowledge imparted to the one sex may very properly 
differ somewhat from that imparted to the other. As 
the mother, — in an especial sense the educator and 
civilizer of the race, — woman needs above every other 
knowledge that of human nature. 

"In accordance with the foregoing principles, this 
Course of Instruction commences with the training of 
the bodily powers, the senses and the verbal memory, 
and ends with studies requiring the exercise of the lofti- 
est faculties. It gives an unusual prominence to the 
study of History, designing it to be taught not simply 
as a narrative of political events, but as giving the life 
and progress of the race, and, by illustration, the deep- 
est lessons of morality, religion, and philosophy. It 
aims to give a like prominence to the sciences which 
treat of the human body and mind and their connec- 
tions, and to cultivate the taste, imagination and moral 
faculties equally with those generally regarded as more 
purely intellectual. In Mathematics and Language, 
studies especially adapted to discipline the intellectual 
powers, the aim is to give a thorough, rather than an 
extensive course, and in Natural Science, so far as prac- 
ticable, to make nature the text-book." 

In Mathematics, Miss Mortimer often taught, 
because of her enjoyment in it, a class in Geometry, 
and the course ended under other instructors with 
Trigonometry, Conic Sections, and applied Mathe- 
matics in Olmsted's Astronomy (Yale College edi- 
tion). In the Classics, Latin was pursued with 
thoroughness in the foundations as Grammar, and 
with zest as Literature, especially in the poetry of 



202 MARY MORTIMER. 

Vergil and the prose of Cicero. In German and 
French, Schiller and Goethe, De Stael and Pascal 
were the favorites, with selections from dramatists, 
critics, and historians. 

In a course formulated and taught by Miss Morti- 
mer in ^Esthetics — Beauty in Nature and the Fine 
Arts and in Architecture and Landscape Gardening 
— much enthusiasm was felt, especially by her 
Baraboo pupils. Faithful drill in the English Lan- 
guage beginning in the Preparatory school was 
carried through the Collegiate department, much 
critical reading and study of English Literature 
being one of the delights of the later years. Polit- 
ical and Physical Geography was always taught in 
connection with History, and Physics, Chemistry, 
Geology, Botany, and Astronomy were made pleas- 
ant and practical, rather than extended studies. 

The extracts which follow, from Miss Mortimer's 
correspondence, will give most vividly the setting 
of the eventful years at Baraboo. 

To Miss T. she writes from the home of O. H. 
Waldo, Esq. : — 

"Milwaukee, Feb. n, 1859. 
". . . My good-bys were so many before I left your 
State that I really grew quite heavy-hearted, especially 
as I do not much like my prospect of being under the 
Synod. I left you, dear Miss T., cogitating on your 
future and my own. ... I reached here at 1 p. m. on 
Saturday. I found myself very warmly greeted in this 
city. . . . Still am I beset with entreaties to stop here, 



THF LrFE WORK. 203 

[in the College] but I see no good reason for doing so. 
I spent Tuesday morning in school, and had a very 
pleasant time with the girls, but the number is small. 
... Of course the Milwaukeeans, outside of our 
church, at least, think it a great absurdity for me to go 
to B. I have nothing specially new about the place or 
school since I came, except, quite to my vexation and 
mortification, the Trustees have been getting a College 
Charter. I am dreading the journey there, a little, 
though I have taken worse ones, and I am afraid I shall 
break with the Presbyterianism." 

To Miss T : — 

"Baraboo, April 16, 1859. 

"Many thanks for the books you are to send. Our 
library at present contains fifty volumes. 

"The income of our school will probably run behind 
its outgo from $400 to $500 this year, but at the close 
of that time we feel quite certain that we shall be able 
to draw from six hundred to one thousand dollars from 
the State. . . . Things look very hopeful here I think, 
only this spring, Wisconsin is in need of ready cash. 
There are very intelligent people here, I think, and a 
very unusual interest in school seems to exist. ... I 
hope we can get Mr. [Thomas] Beecher to come and 
lecture for us." 

" Baraboo, July 17, 1859. 

" Some days I feel bright and hopeful, and then again, 
I am cast down. Our new (school) house, containing 
four large rooms and two small ones, and a clothes 
room and hall, is nearly done, still it will be of little 
service this term. My first quarter's salary is paid. 
The school is nearly sixty this quarter. The girls are 



204 MARY MORTIMER. 

good. The people are interested in the school, some 
of them very much, but I do not know yet on what to 
depend. It seems sometimes that they cannot raise the 
money to do what they propose. . . . I do not know 
what to think, — wish I did. Miss Beecher has sent me 
six varieties of aster seed improved by herself and 
desires me to plant them, and when they grow, think of 
her, — and charges me not to fasten myself here for she 
1 k flows y I shall return to Milwaukee. This week I 
have received a note from our new Chancellor (Hon. 
Henry Barnard, LL. D.) asking me if I am at liberty to 
listen to a proposition to make Madison my teaching 
home. . . . The people here seem good and intelligent, 
but have not shown themselves more disposed to get 
acquainted than the Elmireans, and I do not know them 
very well. ... I do not know that I can improve by 
changing. . . . We close our term four weeks from 
to-day." 

" Baraboo, Sept. 20, 1859. 
" . . . Our matters are going on prosperously. . . . 
We have a fair prospect of numbering eighty or ninety 
young ladies, in the main very studious and well-be- 
haved. We have now a prospect of graduating eight or 
ten a year from next July. Our new teachers are doing 
well. ... I found myself obliged to take classes 
enough to nearly fill my time in school ; expect Miss 
B. to assist me next week, and then shall have a little 
more leisure. Now I am very busy, especially as we 
are hastening to get up the ' Fairy Trial.' . . . Please 
send me my Shakespeare, and Hickok's Mental Phil- 
osophy, and Plutarch's Lives. . . . Sybil has written 



THE LIFE WORK. 205 

me a beautiful letter, as to her frame of mind, but say- 
ing nothing as to her bodily state." 

October 29, Miss Mortimer writes, chiefly by 
the hands of two of her assistant pupils, that she is 
crippled again in her right hand, through overwork, 
and wishes her former physicians in Elmira to pre- 
scribe for her "quickly." The " Fairy Trial" was 
reported a beautiful success, and the coming on of 
a "Teacher's Institute " at which she is invited to 
11 make a speech " is noted. 

" Baraboo, Dec. 29, 1859. 

" My arm has continued getting better since I wrote 
to F. but it is weak yet. . . . We had a Christmas-tree 
and a great gathering at our school-room last Saturday 
evening. We illuminated, gave presents and received, 
though, as we are poor country people, they were not 
costly. We were just as happy as though they had been 
so. This week we have school, but give next Monday 
for a holiday and close four weeks after. 

"Did I write about Miss Beecher? I think her do- 
ings in Milwaukee are bringing forth no new fruit. I 
do not expect to change, although things here are not 
certain by any means. However I feel more hopeful, 
and think I shall like to stay here, if we can get along 
and accomplish what we have set out to. 

" M. writes that she thinks S. is not so well. I see 
that she is full of fears, and I am, too. . . . 

"This is finished Saturday the last day of 1859. I 
wish you all a very happy New Year." 



206 MARY MORTIMER. 

"Baraboo, Feb. 28, i860. 

"We have progressed two weeks on our spring term. 
. . . I am encouraged in this respect, that our people 
do not seem to be at all cast down, — their faith seems 
to grow stronger rather than otherwise, and I continue 
to like to stay here. We are proposing to try to get 
some endowment. We have a pleasant school. We re- 
tain our most advanced classes, and have a prospect of 
graduating seven a year from July. ... I feel very sad 
about my sisters, . . . but perhaps light and strength 
will arise. I must try to get all the courage and strength 
I can for the emergency." 

" Baraboo, May 5, i860. 

" It is summer here, — what is it with you? I trust 
you are comfortable and peaceful. ... It is very hard 
for me to resolve that I cannot go and see you, and so, 
decide to stay here [in vacation], yet I think it must be 
done. Wisconsin is very poor, and will be for some 
time yet, I fear. 

"We are getting on slowly, and yet not so slowly, 
all things considered. We received one hundred and 
twenty dollars' worth of excellent apparatus last week in 
fine order, and with it a dozen nice volumes for the li- 
brary from some friends of Mr. B. in Boston. . . . We 
feel quite decided to have a school-home next fall, and 
M. has agreed to come and take charge of it." 

"Baraboo, July 9, i860. 

"... Perhaps S. has written you that she has sent 
for me to go to New York with her for a consultation. 
I expect to reach Lima the middle of next week, and I 
suppose we shall go on immediately." 



THE LIFE WORK. 207 



To S. M. B. : — 

" Milwaukee, July 14, i860. 

" . . . I am hastening East now, to go to New York 
with another sister for medical treatment. . . . 

"Our term closed very pleasantly on Wednesday 
last." 

To Miss T. : -~ 

"Boston, Aug. 4, i860. 

"I thought, as M. was better, I would leave Geneva 
Monday morning, but she was worse again, and I re- 
mained over that train and the next. S. promised to 
send some one Tuesday, and as M. was again better, 
we concluded I had better come [to Boston]. I reached 
this mansion at one o 'clock Wednesday morning. . . . 
Miss H.'s brother is rather better than he has been, but 
he seems in a very miserable state of health. ..." 

To S. M. B. : — 

" Geneva Water Cure, Aug. 17, i860. 
"Yours of the 2nd instant was delayed. I am still 
kept by sick people. This week I have had three pa- 
tients. My sisters are scarcely better, and it is really 
getting very serious ; but even as you have to endure 
and look up, believing all is well, so must I. . . . 

"I hope to reach Baraboo the last of next week. 
With the hope that we may have a pleasant and profit- 
able year together, I am as ever, 

" Yours affectionately, 

" M. Mortimer." 
To Miss T. : — 

"Baraboo, Sept. 12, i860. 
"I do not know but you have wondered at my si- 
lence, and yet I presume you can easily account for it. 



208 MARY MORTIMER. 

After my return to Geneva I found myself occupied 
with the sick and some other matters, and then there 
was the leaving which was sad enough, with both my 
sisters still so helpless, and scarcely any better, and I 
obliged to leave. 

" There has been considerable small-pox here during 
vacation, and school has not opened so large as I hoped. 
... It seemed very pleasant to get back, however, the 
people are so friendly, and the place so quiet and 
retired. 

"We are somewhat settled in our new home and find 
ourselves quite cosy and comfortable. 

"Since I came, I have heard several times from Ge- 
neva, but my intelligence about S. is not at all encour- 
aging. Her husband writes very sadly and despairingly 
about her, and M. not much more hopefully. She 
gains no strength, — cannot be gotten up without the 
greatest suffering and exhaustion. I fear I may not see 
her again, but hope. M. is better, — wrote a few lines, 
but I do not think there is any great improvement, even 
in her case. . . . 

"This housekeeping uses up a good many odd min- 
utes." 

"Baraboo, Nov. 8, i860. 

"... I have some anxious hours over our prospects 
in school, and fear I may yet have to leave here. . . . 

"We have our house furnished very comfortably, — 
indeed I think it looks quite well." 

A note addressed en route to one of her Baraboo 
pupils in February, 1861, shows Miss Mortimer on 
her way East that she may bid a last farewell to the 
sister whose lovely character had filled her life with 



THE LIFE WORK. 209 

joy, and who, from the time when their mother 
was taken from their sight, had been the object of 
Miss Mortimer's tenderest affection. The journey 
was begun in mid-winter, and was too formidable 
to allow of the teacher's return to her duties 
promptly at the beginning of the second term. To 
the Senior Class she addressed the following letter 
on the way: — 

"Detroit, Wednesday, Feb., 1861. 

"My Dear Young Ladies : Here am I when I ought 
to be almost to Suspension Bridge, and as I have to 
wait four or five hours yet, I will write you what I have 
been thinking about your Butler class. 

" We ran into a train last night, but it was no great 
affair, except that it has caused us twelve hours delay. 
I have eaten my dinner, and been up into the city to 
get something to read, but will write before I begin to 
read, lest I should become too much interested in my 
book afterward. 

" I trust your compositions are fully under way ; that 
you are writing with all courage and earnestness. You 
will do better for my absence, at least so I think, for 
you must rely upon yourselves. Do not delay, make 
good use of your afternoons, and do the very best you 
can, and all will be well. 

"And now, as to Butler, I want to suggest a few 
thoughts about its relations to our studies thus far. 
You remember that we reached this conclusion, — that 
the Christian religion must be the true one ; yet we did 
not come to this conclusion so fully and clearly as I 
desired, and we shall go back by and by and seek his- 
15 



210 MARY MORTIMER. 

torical proof that Christ was a true Teacher sent from 
God. Meantime, however, if you have carefully re- 
ceived and kept the arguments and facts we have con- 
sidered, you have a very strong proof, it seems to me. 
That we may confirm this in every way, we consider in 
Butler the objections often urged against the general 
doctrine of religion, as well as against that of Christian- 
ity. If you are carefully and earnestly attentive to 
Butler's argument, you will find that these objections 
one by one fade away, as the mist before the sunlight, 
and you will find your own minds strengthened. 
• " These objections, too, you will notice, are such as, 
to a greater or less extent, have come to your own 
minds, and they are answered in such a way as to carry 
you quite above the habit of regarding morals, nature, 
religion, as separate things. 

' 'We have said, you remember, that Truth is one. 
Butler will aid you to see and feel this, for he shows, 
with a power unequaled by others, all things, the small- 
est as well as the greatest, connected in the same great 
scheme, so that the wonderful declaration of Christ, 
'Even the hairs of your head are numbered,' becomes 
clear and certain by a logical argument. I trust you 
will dwell upon this, that it will grow clear and rich to 
you, and above all, I trust you will make a personal 
application of the truth that we study. I have said less 
in this direction than I might, hoping you would your- 
selves make a more powerful application than I could. 

"If Truth is so glorious and man was made for it; 
if religion is its highest development, and man is most 
distinctively a religious being ; what are our obligations 
to be religious? If Christ came into the world, as He 



THE LIFE WORK. 211 



says, to teach us Truth, and to save us, what are our 
obligations to him? 

"Some of you, yes, all, have admitted the force of 
these obligations. Why should any of you delay to 
yield obedience to them ? The simplicity, the practica- 
bility of religion, Butler will set before you. It is no 
strange, remote subject, but, in the decisons and acts it 
requires, is like your common life. 

"I wish you to improve all your spare time in writ- 
ing an analysis of Butler. 

"Do not neglect to read < Fine Arts/ and treasure up 
in your minds all you can. Have Miss F. come into 
the class. 

" With earnest prayers for your highest good, believe 
me Always yours, 

<<M. M." 

To Miss T. : — 

" Baraboo, March 19, 1861. 

", . . S. still lies so placid and cheerful that it is, I 
believe, more pleasant than painful to think of her. I 
had to control myself as I looked at her six weeks ago, 
fearing that it was for the last time, for her lips quiv- 
ered and her eyes filled with tears. But day after day 
I had watched her, with her eyes full of light, her voice 
of kindness. What a memory these days will be to me? 
She is almost an angel, I think. I feel more like prais- 
ing God that He has given her to us so long than like 
murmuring that He may soon take her to Himself. 

t( I was very glad to get your far-away, letter from 
the South, where they do not believe in the Union, and 
where I did not like to have you go. I am glad again 
to hear that you are safe back. . . . And now, in these 



212 MARY MORTIMER. 

days of doubt and trouble, how glad I should be to 
hear about the feeling and the real condition of the 
South from yourself. What is to become of them, and 
of the nation ? What do you wish the government would 
do ? What can it do? I cannot see any hope that the 
Southern States will return. . . . If the speeches and acts 
of their public men and of their papers, religious and 
secular, are to be trusted, then slavery, now and for- 
ever, slavery there, slavery everywhere, is the sole con- 
dition of peace. The breaking of the Union is sad and 
disgraceful enough, but the reason is almost infinitely 
sadder and more disgraceful. . . . 

"I wish sometimes that I had faith enough to say / 
will stay here, and take things as they come, for better 
or worse, but I do not quite reach that point yet. I 
cannot tell about our prospects, — the national affairs 
cast a cloud over everything. Wars and rumors of wars 
offer poor encouragements to educational enterprises. I 
wish I knew what I ought to do, but light will break in 
upon the path as I need it, if I look up, and I will try." 

These were indeed stirring days in Baraboo, where 
circumstances combined to make feeling run as high, 
at times, as in the border States themselves. 

With the opening of spring amid all the dear 
delights of this beauteous region, the strange sounds 
of drum and fife were soon heard in the streets 
and on the village green, with the tramp of the mili- 
tary company now forming in response to the call 
for troops, passing the doors of the Seminary in 
daily drill. Ere long came the farewell in the pub- 
lic square ; school was dismissed that daughters and 



THE LIFE WORK. 213 

sisters might take a last look at fathers and brothers 
going forth to war, with a suddenness which was 
more in semblance of dreams than like living real- 
ity. In the bright light of that spring morning, the 
green of the grass and the trees is mingled in our 
memories with the blue of uniforms, the glitter of 
epaulettes, the scarlet of sashes, and the gleam of 
swords and bayonets ; the quiet chirp and warble 
of the birds is lost in the stirring strains of military 
music. Two of the Executive Committee of the 
Board of Trustees of the Seminary stepped, as we 
gazed, a little aside from the crowd. One was of 
Northern blood and principles, and his commanding 
form bore the insignia of military rank, with sword 
and sash dangling by his side. One was an honest 
Virginian, his kind face troubled beyond measure, 
and his true eyes clouded with doubt. The two 
men clasped hands, and he who was going to the 
front left with the Southerner in a few low and 
heartful words, "in case anything should happen," 
the charge of his young family now to be left with- 
out their natural protector. The two men did not 
see all things alike, but they were townsmen, neigh- 
bors, friends, and Christians, and they trusted one 
another, even amid their doubts and anxieties. 

Intensely feeling and clearly seeing the issues be- 
fore the country and the world, and with the poign- 
ant arrows of keenest family sorrows piercing her 
heart, Miss Mortimer rose to the heights of un- 
wonted strength and radiance in the closing months 



214 MARY A/OR TIMER. 

of the school year. The last Sunday evening but 
one before the close of the term, she asked the 
class about to graduate to meet her in the school- 
room at six o'clock. She stood before us with a 
sense of the solemn responsibilities of life we were 
about to meet, and gave us, from a carefully pre- 
pared manuscript, with the look and tone of an in- 
spired or angelic being, her parting counsel. She was 
both beautiful and graceful in that uplifting hour, 
and a halo seemed almost visible about her. In an 
intimate acquaintance and friendship of nearly a 
quarter of a century, the inspiration of that hour 
had for one of her pupils no parallel, and others 
saw and felt the same. 

This summer brought Miss Mortimer's friend from 
Boston to visit her in Baraboo, and later the be- 
reaved husband of her translated sister came bring- 
ing his little boy, who was to be left in her charge. 
Invitations to take up work elsewhere were press- 
ing ; Miss Mortimer took one hurried jonrney to a 
distant State, and returned, to spend a little time in 
Milwaukee and Boscobel with family friends. 

She writes from — 

"Baraboo, Aug. 15, 1861. 

". . . The year, I fear, is going to be the hardest 
we have known. . . . We hope for good things, but 
must prepare for hard times, and bear them cheer- 
fully." 

To Miss T. : — 



THE LIFE WORK. 215 

"Baraboo, Sept. 7, 1861. 

". . . Our sister has faded away, but left a halo 
more glorious than the brightest sunset. Surely we will 
not mourn for her. Still I did feel it more than I 
thought I should, but not to repine. God be praised 
that so gently he took his beloved to Himself, that He 
gathered her children about her to see her pass away to 
the better land, that He has given us such a treasure in 
her memory. My heart is full of gratitude, though the 
tears will come that I can see her no more here. Ed- 
mund [her sister's son] has joined the army. ... I 
went to since I wrote, and was disgusted posi- 
tively, — such pretense and show and parade of piety I 
believe I never saw equaled. . . . 

"Baraboo seemed like an oasis in the desert to me 
when I returned. ... I hope I shall not have to leave 
here. I like Baraboo and my school. We have 
opened the term very well. . . . Though my heart is 
sad, I yet feel thankful and happy. God is very good 
to us. 

"I have had a very hard summer, for, besides hav- 
ing both house and school to look after, Miss W. was 
quite ill nearly a month, and that hurried and exciting 
journey tried me exceedingly. . . . 

"I should very much "like to hear more about your 
Georgia experience. . . . The West generally is fierce 
for the War and the Union." 

"Baraboo, Oct. 27, 1861. 
"We have had barely a hint that something bad has 
happened down in Pennsylvania. I hope Ed. will fight, 
if fight he must, heroically for his country." 



216 MARY MORTIMER. 

To her Baraboo pupils : — 

''Milwaukee, Nov. 12, 1861. 

"My Dear Young Ladies : It is eight days since I 
left you, and I am getting anxious to return. 

"Of the city I promised to write you something, and 
must hasten to redeem my promise. Miss C. said to 
me the other day, 'Doesn't Milwaukee seem pleasant 
to you ? ' The question set me to thinking, and I con- 
cluded it did not seem so pleasant to me to get here, as 
to get to Baraboo. Still Milwaukee is pleasant, and it 
is very pleasant to meet some here who love me still. 
But I find they have trials very like ours in the country. 

"For instance, I met several [of the College girls] last 
week who were lamenting in dolorous tones their busy 
life and the difficulty of keeping up interest in their So- 
ciety ? I listened, and thought what the trouble was. 
Poor children! they lack faith and courage and system; 
and I wondered if we, your teachers, shall be able so to 
teach you that you shall not lack these. . . . 

"I should be very glad if we could learn and show 
forth all the taste and grace of the city without its ex- 
travagance, its frivolity, or its artificiality. Surely, 
nature is more graceful than the city, and, surrounded 
by it, I believe if we drink in its spirit, we shall attain 
its higher grace. 

"The chief event which has occurred, I think, since 
my arrival, was the departure of the Tenth Regiment, 
which went off in fine style Saturday morning. A thou- 
sand men well-dressed, marching in order through the 
streets to the sound of fine music, is an exhilarating 
sight, but my thoughts as I gazed upon them, wandered 
to their future, and the sight grew so melancholy that I 



THE LIFE WORK. 21 



concluded that I wished to see no more regiments de- 
part for the war. 

" Milwaukee hardly seems so gay to me as formerly. 
I wonder that, in the state of the country, we can be 
engaged as we are, but human beings have a wonderful 
faculty of springing from pressure, and so we go on, 
eating and sleeping, dressing and attending to our 
pleasure and business, about the same as though no 
half million of men in our own once peaceful country 
were in arms for the purpose of destroying each other, 
and covering this fair land with desolation. I still hope 
we shall gain enough to pay the fearful cost of the strug- 
gle, but the future only can show. Let us not be 
thoughtless and careless, for there are most earnest 
admonitions coming to us. Pride, boastfulness, go 
before destruction. Principle is worth more than life — 
how much more than the wealth, station, display, we 
have so earnestly sought, I have no words to tell. 

"I began to write you about the city, but you can- 
not but see that it is not an interesting subject to me, — 
my pen keeps running away. . . . 

"I was made happy Saturday evening by an excel- 
lent report from you, and I feel the fullest confidence 
that you are prospering, and that you are faithful to my 
injunctions. Would that you were all equally faithful 
to the good Father to whom you owe all your blessings. 
I hope to see you next week, and that we shall have so 
pleasant and profitable a winter together that Old 
Boreas cannot, in the least, disturb our peace or 
progress. 

"This is a poor letter, my dear children. If I were 
not so dull I would burn it up and begin again. As it 



218 MARY MORTIMER. 



is, you must put up with it, and believe that I love you 
just as well as though I had shown it more eloquently." 

To Miss T. : — 

" Baraboo, Dec. 26, 1861. 

". . . My letter wouldn't go on, for Christmas was 
coming, and came, and I had to stop writing. 

"Some weeks ago, the ladies, stirred up by Mrs. B., 
put down a very nice carpet on the floor of my recita- 
tion-room, all secretly ; and now, at Christmas, the 
gentlemen surprised me with a nice and very comfort- 
able chair for the same room, and various other things 
came from my pupils. So, kind and beautiful deeds 
keep coming. 

"Our school-house was crowded at our Christmas 
Eve celebration, and our tree heavily laden, with many 
things also under it. 

"We are troubled about the state of the country, 
afraid of a war with England, and so forth. But the 
Lord reigns, and we must trust Him. I hope, and yet 
fear dark days, — many, and very dark. This precious 
Christmas was a bright interlude. 

"Frank has had a very interesting letter from his 
brother, E., telling us of his camp life, etc. He seems 
to be in a very proper state of mind for a soldier, brave 
and patriotic and contented." 

To S. M. B. at Ottawa, 111. : — 

"Baraboo, May n, 1862. 
"My Dear M. : The prospect from my window is 
exquisite to-day, the blending of color almost equal in 



THE LIFE WORK. 219 



variety to the autumn, but so different, — the brightest, 
most delicate green, the softest brown. I wish you 
could look at it, but probably your landscape is even 
brighter, for you are nearer the southern skies, and. I 
remember those bluffs upon which you now gaze, as 
very beautiful. . . . 

"God bless you, dear M., and make you calm and 
strong, peaceful and abundantly successful in all noble 
works. 

"Your going away was quite inopportune, but we 
must make the best of it." 

To Miss T : — 

"Baraboo, May 14, 1862. 

" , . . I, too, am tired and anxious, but shall try to 
rest and trust and be cheerful. Indeed, amid all the 
labors and trials, there is so much that is bright in life 
that I cannot despair. God is good, and He reigns. 
That ought to be enough to keep us calm and peaceful, 
whatever happens. . . . 

"May 30; Before I finished my last sentence, our 
last year's graduates, who voted that each would write 
something for the close of the year, came to consult. 
Then one of our Trustees came to talk about school, 
and then, — I had a cold and a headache. I feel a 
good deal better this morning, and now hope to stir 
about and get something done. . . . Our term is draw- 
ing to a close, only five weeks to examinations, and 
then — I do not know what. I have been thinking and 
talking about prolonging my vacation, for I do not 
want to get old and decrepit a minute before it is neces- 
sary. . . .. 



220 MARY MORTIMER. 

" Our prospects of permanent buildings and endow- 
ments are dubious, — this horrid war interferes with all 
good things. When will it end and how? God only 
knows. I am not so sanguine as many. So far as I can 
see, the Southerners have n't the least idea of giving up, 
and the hot weather, and yellow fever, and I know not 
what horrors are before us. But the Lord reigns and 
we must trust Him. Edmund was in the hospital in 
Philadelphia the last we heard from him, sick from ex- 
posure in the advance on Yorktown. His father was 
expecting him home, but as we hear nothing further 
about it, and he is better, I fear this has not been per- 
mitted. 

" Things go on quite smoothly with us as a school, 
still I do not know but we may resolve to give up our 
ship. I hope not, for I still like to live here. ... In 
religious matters the town is divided and distressed, 
but the Lord reigns. Truth is mighty and will pre- 
vail." 

It was the darkest period of the war, and the 
smoke of the battles of the summer of 1862 spread 
a pall of gloom over the North. The Rev. Z. M. 
Humphrey, D. D. came from his Chicago pastorate 
to deliver the Anniversary address, and the white- 
robed graduates and post-graduates discussed their 
themes on graduation day in the beautifully trimmed 
church, amid a throng of interested friends. The 
"moral uses of dark things" was a subject on 
which more than one mind sought light, and in 
various aspects. The outlook, for the country and 
the school, was wholly changed since Miss Morti- 



THE LIFE WORK. 221 

mer took up her abode in this idyllic retreat 
three and a half years before. Still beauty was 
there, and loyalty and love, though hope was de- 
parting, and Miss Mortimer, visiting at Milwaukee, 
Janesville, Watertown, in vacation, courageously 
faced the uncertainties of another school year. 

At Milwaukee, where College affairs were, if pos- 
sible, lower and more involved than those of the 
Seminary at Baraboo, Miss Mortimer tarried a few 
days in the latter part of July, — " very busy and 
very tired." "The Alumnae of the College," she 
wrote, ' ' have coaxed me into giving them a 
speech, which I agreed to, if they would wait till 
to-day." 

To S. M. B. : — 

"Milwaukee, Aug. n, 1862. 
"... I trust all things in the future will be pleas- 
ant, though that is rather a large hope. 

"The year before us looks more uncertain than any 
previous one. Mr. H's. house (additional) is engaged, 
though I fear, since this draft is established, we shall 
not need it, and I regret having encouraged the taking 
of it in case we do not. But it is impossible to decide 
anything, and we must run some risks. I think now 
that we will not furnish the house till I know more 
about our numbers, and the consequence may be that 
we shall be in some confusion at the beginning of 
the term, but it will not be serious. . . . 

"I think you would better take what the catalogue 
has arranged as the Second Department." 



222 MARY MORTIMER. 

" Baraboo, Aug. 25. 
".I do feel more than heretofore doubtful about con- 
tinuing long in Baraboo. . . . 

" God bless you, and keep you in perfect peace." 

To Miss T : — 

"Baraboo, Sept. 13, 1862. 

" . . . These are very sad days and it is only in re- 
membering that the Lord reigns, that comfort and hope 
come. We must learn to put our trust in Him and be 
at rest. . . . 

"I want to hear about Mr. F. and if you think he 
would be a very valuable acquisition for the Milwaukee 
College, and whether you think he could be obtained. 

"... I have been thinking about getting away from 
school for a time this fall, and going to visit you and 
some other Eastern friends, but as yet, I am doubtful. 
Should I go, I now think it would be about Nov. 1, but 
all is uncertain. . . . 

"We have at length, more than a month after it 
occurred, heard of Edmund's death, alone, among 
strangers, in a hospital in Maryland. It is unspeakably 
sad to us, but how many surfer as we do ! When will 
it end ? Why is it that as a Christian people we do not 
cry out more earnestly and constantly to the Father of 
all mercies to lead us out of this dreadful war ? " 

En route to the East. 

"Oct. 24, 1862. 

"To the School : I am having rather a sad visit, 
with a sorrowing young widow whose husband died 
alone among strangers, a victim to this terrible war. I 
was very tired when I reached here, and it was almost 



THE LIFE WORK. 223 

too much for me, meeting the brother and the wife of 
our lost Edmund. She looks very sad and sweet. . . . 
"The prayer has been rising in my heart all the 
morning that you will be so true and noble that this 
dreadful war with its blights and sorrows shall not be 
needed to punish you." 

"Boston, Nov. 25, 1862. 

" My Dear Pupils : You have heard perhaps by this 
time of my lame arm, which tells me now I must not 
write, — but I cannot resist writing a little. 

"Last night my heart was so full of you, — I cannot 
tell you all I felt. That nice letter from the little girls 
came and made me very proud and happy — and then 
the Senior Class wrote, and one of the teachers also, 
and you were all before me, and I was so grateful, to 
you, dear children, and to your teachers, and to the 
Good Father above who puts it into the hearts of my 
far-away children to be so loving and true." 

"Dec. 5, 1862. 
"Boston seems to be very, active and prosperous, in 
spite of the war. ... I think the sober New Eng- 
land people have never been so extravagant, consider- 
ing their circumstances, as we Western people are. They 
do not walk so fast, do not look so excited, do not 
jump to conclusions so quickly, — but they are very 
fierce on the slavery question, some of them, and hate 
England with a fervent hatred. I heard a gentleman 
say, the other day, that the chief article in his religion 
was hatred to England. . . . People seem to feel a good 
deal of courage about the war, notwithstanding its diffi- 
culties." 



224 MARY MORTIMER. 

"Boston, Dec. 30, 1862. 
"Last Sunday I heard Professor Park again, and was 
as much delighted as the Sunday before. The Mental 
Philosophy Class, at least, will understand me if I tell 
you that the professor's eloquence led me into the emo- 
tive state too soon for me to have the power to give a 
good sketch of the sermons, but I think they will help 
me to teach you better. There was so much thought 
crowded into them, and it was so suggestive, that I 
sometimes seemed so overwhelmed as almost to raise 
my hands to hold back the flood, which was well-nigh 
too much to bear. I have heard nothing since I left 
you, so delightful, so true, as I think." 

It was the time of the darkest outlook in the 
war, when irreparable financial embarrassments 
came upon the Baraboo Seminary through the 
business failure of some of its most self-sacrificing 
friends. Miss Mortimer's health had been such 
as to necessitate considerable absences from the 
school for recuperation. Still she clung with love 
to the simple life, the satisfactory intellectual work, 
the intense loyalty and faithfulness of friends and 
pupils here ; to the communion with nature she 
here enjoyed, and to the high ideal, the possibility 
of realizing which this experiment had done so 
much toward confirming. 

But the combination of disaster was too much 
for the survival of her hopes, and sorrowfully she 
bade adieu to Baraboo in the summer of 1863, her 
own health so precarious that she could not look 



THE LIFE WORK. 225 

forward to further teaching without an extended 
period of rest. 

Once more, in July, 1864, former teachers and 
pupils gathered there in reunion, for their hearts 
clung to the place where together they had shared 
so much happiness and inspiration. But no 
hope remained of attaining the objects for which 
the school had been established. Miss Mortimer, 
and her former teachers and pupils tarried for a 
little at the parting of the ways in loving remem- 
brance, to rejoice in the welcome accorded by true 
and faithful hearts there, and to revel in the de- 
lights of nature. High communion they had of 
things which can never die, and delights which can 
never fade away, and then they parted, refreshed 
by this draught at life's Elim, but not again to 
tarry beside those wells of comfort together. 

The difficulties between the trustees of Mil- 
waukee College and the Educational Association, 
which had led to Miss Mortimer's withdrawal from 
this institution to whose founding she had devoted 
the energies and the toil of so many years, were by 
no means settled. Miss Beecher, as the represent- 
ative of the Association, bore the brunt of the bat- 
tle. The question now was in regard to the 
$20,000 endowment promised by the Association on 
certain conditions. These conditions, Miss Beecher 
maintained, had not been met. Five thousand 
dollars of the promised endowment had, however, 
been paid in. 

16 



22 G MARY MORTIMER. 

Miss Mortimer writes from — 

"Andover, Mass., Aug. 31, 1863. 

u l received a letter from Miss Beecher yesterday. 
She is nothing daunted, — is going on to raise the en- 
dowment, she says, and expects we will take possession 
of the college next year." 

Miss Mortimer, however, was not so sanguine, 
and even if she had desired to return to Milwaukee, 
the state of her health, and the recent bereavement 
of her friend in Boston, combined to keep her for 
the present in the East. Without making a defi- 
nite arrangement to do so, and with the occasional 
diversion of visits to friends in New York, Miss 
Mortimer remained with her friend, Miss Hunting- 
ton, in Boston and vicinity for nearly two years 
after leaving her work at Baraboo. Most of this 
period was spent in Auburndale, then a beautiful 
young suburb of Boston, where, either in the semi- 
nary there, or in the home of Miss Huntington, 
Miss Mortimer constantly had classes of young la- 
dies under her instruction in advanced studies, with- 
out the care and labor attendant upon a permanent 
settlement for herself. 

To Miss T. : — 

" Auburndale, June n, 1864. 

"I am teaching Butler, Evidences of Christianity, 
and Geometry, and enjoy it very much when I am well 
enough to enjoy anything .... With gold at 200 per 
cent, and Richmond not yet taken, and the South stiff- 
necked as ever, our sky looks cloudy. But the Lord 



THE LIFE WORK. 227 

reigns. May He subdue us all to Himself, at whatever 
cost." 

To S. M. B. : — 

" AUBURNDALE, Oct. 20, 1864. 

"... . I look back longingly to those Baraboo days 
and labors. ... I do not at present expect to return 
to Wisconsin, though, so far as my own feelings are 
concerned, I should prefer it. . . . It is very grateful 
to my feelings that all my pupils appear to look back so 
affectionately to their days at Baraboo. It is blessed 
to have helped anybody to flowers and sunshine." 

To Miss T. : — 

" AUBURNDALE, Nov. 20, 1864. 

"Did not the election pass off triumphantly ? The 
order preserved gives me more hope of the country, and 
pride in it, if I may so express myself, than almost any- 
thing else has done. It is grand, and now I hope Mr. 
Lincoln will prove equal to his day, and liberty and 
law will have a great triumph." 

To S. M. B. : — 

"AUBURNDALE, Nov. 27, 1864. 

"... My spirits are rising of late. My health is 
improving wonderfully. I am not so strong and buoy- 
ant as I would like to be, but am so much better than 
heretofore that I feel like rising and doing large things. 
Then, our election was so triumphant, not more in that 
the right party triumphed, than that the other be- 
haved so well ! Surely the Lord smiled upon us. I 
had a glad and thankful Thanksgiving, heard an appre- 
ciative sermon which greatly delighted me, and I have 
set up my banner. Thus far the Lord has helped us, — 



228 MARY MORTIMER. 

has shown the value of freedom. . . . My dear M., I 
hope our best lessons together bring forth blessed fruit 
in your heart and life. ... I am reading — too hastily 
— Herbert Spencer's New Philosophy. He divides all 
Knowledge into the Knowable and the Unknowable, 
and shows that the knowable in all departments rests 
on the unknowable. Science and religion are alike in 
this, and come together, by the last analysis we can 
attain, on Force. He advances a little in one respect 
on some positions of Sir William Hamilton, and the 
author of l Limits of Religious Thought,' while with 
them he says that Space, the Infinite, Absolute Cause, 
and so forth, are not thinkable. Yet we must assume 
them without knowing them, for their existence is 
reached by a fair indication from what we do know. 

"I cannot tell what the book is to come to. It 
deals with the material universe and inductions from 
its phenomena, and these, carried through everything 
from minerals up to man as an individual, and in so- 
ciety. I get the impression that it will lead practically 
to fatalism and atheism. The author never uses the 
word God, nor any but the most abstract word that can 
be substituted for that. He gives religion great praise 
for having everywhere and always contended for a 
grand mystery underlying all knowledge, — which sci- 
ence has almost eschewed. But aside from this, sci- 
ence has reasoned better, at least I think this is his 
idea. . . . 

"I have read also 'Nineteen Beautiful Years' with 
much interest and pleasure. Your Cousin Mary's 
Journal shows a beautiful and wise character, and the 
compiler has done her work gracefully, I think. . . . 

" I do not know when I have written so long a letter. 



THE LIFE WORK. 229 

It, and Church, and Herbert Spencer have made me 
desperately tired." 

" Lasell Seminary, 

" Auburndale, Jan. 5, 1865. 

"My Dear M. : . . . As for the main question, it 
does not seem to me that it would be wise for you to 
go into the hospitals. Your health is not sufficient, 
and then others, who could not do the work you can 
do in other fields of action, can do as well, — and with 
more health, perhaps better, — for the Sanitary Com- 
mission. . . . 

"Your post as teacher, an interesting and useful one, 
sought you, — should you go, you would turn from it to 
seek other work. 

"lam glad our home in Baraboo keeps a warm spot 
in your hearts. ... To keep your heart warm ? love, 
always love, first the Father above, then His children, 
everywhere, and dear M. also. 

"Yours with trusting affection, 

"M. M." 

To S. M. B. : — 

"Auburndale, Dec. 28, 1865. 

" My Dear M. : Christmas morning there came to me 
an exquisitely beautiful gift — beautiful in itself from 
any stranger, even, but to me, from her who sent it, so 
much more so ! How full of precious memories, of 
sweet, plaintive associations of the past ! Do I flatter 
myself too much, as I look upon that cross in its ex- 
quisite surroundings of leaf and flower, — made as it 
seems by fairy fingers, — that I seem to see into the 
heart behind, and find every movement of the fingers 
dictated by fervent, enduring love for Truth and Beauty, 



230 MARY MORTIMER. 

and for the teacher who, so feebly, in the past, tried to 
teach you of them ? 

"I seem to see there the best lessons of our past 
together stamped indelibly, and the light nickering 
through the garniture which surrounds that heart, even 
as it flickers through this snowy material which gives 
the shape of that which light makes, — glorious, beauti- 
ful light, emblem to us of the highest and best. 

11 Thanks, many and fervent, my dear M., for your 
beautiful work, for this sweet expression of your love, 
for this exquisite crystallization, as it were, of our best 
past together, — thanks, especially, as I realize how 
your time and strength must have been taxed besides. 

"I have made no special progress as regards future 
arrangements since I wrote you. Mr. Waldo writes 
very hopefully about College matters, and though I like 
New England very much, I shall return very cheerfully 
to Wisconsin if thereby I can save the College to what 
seems to me its rightful object, — especially as much 
the larger number of my friends is West. 

"And our old friend, who was so wise and true, so 
faithful to her Master, has gone ! Mr. B. has had 
inscribed over my sister : — 

" ' He giveth His beloved sleep.' 

"To Morilla, too, it is applicable. It is good for 
her, but what a loss for husband and children, and 
for many besides. 

"I have been lying still this afternoon, looking at the 
light as you let it come to me in beautiful leaves and 
flowers, bodying forth the emblem of Him whose pres- 
ence has, I trust, made your Christmas a blessed sea- 
son, and will give you a happy New Year. 



CHAPTER VII. 

SECOND ADMINISTRATION AT MILWAUKEE COLLEGE. 

Nine years had passed since Miss Mortimer's re- 
tirement from active participation in the instruction 
and management of Milwaukee College, though in 
this time she had not ceased to feel the deepest 
interest in its successful progress, nor intermitted 
such general efforts in its behalf as her benevolent 
heart, and her abiding feeling for woman's higher 
education, rendered necessary and imperative. 

She had made frequent visits to the school, es- 
pecially while it was under the charge of her 
successors and friends, the Misses Chapin, and had 
sometimes accepted invitations to address the 
Alumnae and the pupils, or to attend and take part 
in its examinations. 

In Miss Mortimer the public had unwavering 
confidence ; some of the most influential and promi- 
inent Trustees, with their families, were her warm 
personal friends ; and more than all, Miss Beecher 
had ever regarded Miss Mortimer's presence and 
participation in the affairs of the College indispens- 
able to the success of her plan. 

From the time when Miss Mortimer was released 
from Baraboo Seminary, Miss Beecher's hopefulness 

[231] 



232 MARY MORTIMER. 

seems to have prompted renewed endeavor for a 
settlement of the controversy between the Educa- 
tional Association and the Trustees as to the 
College Plan, and to regard Miss Mortimer's return 
as a matter of course, as indeed she had always 
affirmed it to be. 

Miss Mortimer's resignation had been received 
by the Trustees of the College ' ' with reluctance, 
and accepted with regret. " l "At the meeting of the 
Association in the spring of 1865, Miss Mortimer 
was appointed its agent to settle its affairs at the 
College." 

' ' Peaceful and compromising counsels prevailed. 
The Trustees, influenced by an almost unanimous 
public sentiment, and actuated by a sincere desire 
to adopt the course that would ensure harmony, 
. . . held a meeting April 21, 1866, and unani- 
mously appointed Messrs. Waldo, Brigham, and 
Van Dyke a committee to negotiate with Miss 
Mortimer concerning resuming the management of 
the College." 

i ' This was the end of the controversy. The 
Association, backed by public sentiment, secured 
the return of Miss Mortimer, and a partial recur- 
rence to the early plan." 

" On June 13, 1866, the Board ordered the exe- 
cution of a lease with Miss Mortimer, and the ap- 
pearance of the Catalogue of 1866-7, with her 
name at the head of the faculty of instruction. " 

1 Wight's " Annals of Milwaukee College." 



THE LIEE WORK. 233 

Nothing new, either in principle or practice, char- 
acterized Miss Mortimer's resumption of her old 
position at Milwaukee College. The aims and 
methods of education there from 1866 to 1874, 
were identical with those she had endeavored to 
carry out in the same institution from 1850 to 1857 
and at Baraboo Seminary from 1859 to 1863 ; the 
course of study was essentially the same, and above 
all, the same potent personality exerted its stimu- 
lating formative force upon plastic character. At 
the first, two of her associate instructors were for- 
mer pupils at Baraboo ; two were most accom- 
plished teachers from the East. 

From time to time, changes were made in the 
personnel of the faculty, by marriage, bereave- 
ment, or other vicissitudes, but so carefully did 
Miss Mortimer make her selections with a view to 
individual adaptations to the work, that several of 
the leading teachers remained for years, not only 
supplementing her work and influence, but making 
their own most marked and enduring impressions 
upon the characters of their pupils. 

One of these associate teachers has now for 
many years been successfully endeavoring in Asiatic 
Turkey to uplift and bless its degraded and op- 
pressed daughters. In reply to a request for some 
glimpses of the life of the teachers associated with 
Miss Mortimer in these years, this lady writes in a 
preliminary note : — 



234 MARY MORTIMER. 



"You know nearly all the persons who shared in 
that life at the College-home in Milwaukee are living. 
I could do nothing without individualizing them a lit- 
tle. There was plenty that was entertaining and inspir- 
iting if one had either the power or the liberty to speak 
with any plainness and personal discrimination of the 
members of that household. I only send you what I 
have written to show you that in all sincerity I did set 
myself to review the life there and to express my 
thoughts upon it. ... I want to thank you for setting 
my thoughts at work on such a subject. It has done 
me good to think of, and to recognize to myself what I 
did not know how to express, — Miss Mortimer's in- 
voluntary and inevitable sympathy with every form of 
earnest life." 

Taking up the subject as requested, this writer 
continues : — 

LIFE AT THE COLLEGE-HOME. 

"The women who formed a part of that life were 
drawn there to live and work together, in part from 
Miss Mortimer's personal interest and faith in them, in 
part from the failure of original plans and combina- 
tions and the necessity for calling in, sometimes, un- 
known elements. 

"The teachers were mostly women in the maturity 
of womanhood, and if any one characteristic belonged 
to them, collectively, it was a sturdy independence in 
thinking and acting. There was a great deal of mental 
activity among them, — a keen zest for the work they 
had in hand individually, and much mutual stimulus, 
with very little mutual warmth. For several years it 



THE LIFE WORK. 235 

must have been quickly evident to any one visiting the 
home, that organic unity in whatever pertained to the 
social life there was wanting. On the other hand there 
were a number of groups, in each of which there was 
strong mutual affection, intensity of feeling and intel- 
lectual life. Every instrument was keyed high. In 
the class-rooms, the work of the day was absorbing. 
At night, the relaxation was a chapter of Emerson or 
Goethe, Carlyle, or Cousin, or Dante, or some stirring 
discussion in which there was the most fearless freedom 
of speech. No one's self-love was wounded because 
another entertained different views from her own. 
There was indeed a remarkable freedom from those lit- 
tle personalities which are apt to creep in where there 
is vehement feeling, and keen and persistent advocacy 
of opposing views. There was also a refreshing ab- 
sence of explanations and timid qualifying of expres- 
sions, lest some one should fancy something was meant 
that was not fully said. 

"It was interesting to note how one of these groups 
stimulated another. Nothing was welcome that was 
not, in some sense, intense, — a master of thought, a 
poet thrilling with passionate utterance, or, if philan- 
thropy were considered, it must have integrity, simplic- 
ity, and an utter absence of self-consciousness. 

"It was a time of growth and education to those 
women that few of them at the time realized, — the after 
look revealed this. Miss Mortimer herself, more often 
unconsciously than consciously, intensified the life of 
every one about her. To some, this was for a time a 
source of pain ; it must be always so where there is 
much greater strength on the one side than on the other, 



236 MARY MORTIMER. 

with perhaps imperfect mutual sympathy. Doubtless 
there was more of real growth in character, the charac- 
ter itself was a more varied product and a stronger one, 
than if there had been more of mutual adaptation and 
less of individuality. 

"To Miss Mortimer it was in some sense necessary 
that she have such elements about her. The loving 
devotion that centered everything in her and only 
asked to know her thought in order to adopt that 
thought for its own, would have given her a sense of 
satiety. She, in turn, required to live in an atmosphere 
of vigorous thought. Not infrequently, when she sat 
down to a solitary game of backgammon in her study, 
playing one hand against the other, the problem behind, 
that sharpened every perception, was how, without 
abating the individuality of any one, to concentrate and 
bring to bear upon the school the sum total of power 
and willingness in those about her. P. L. C." 

The following letter gives both a humorous de- 
scription of Miss Mortimer from her own point of 
view, and characteristic references to her associ- 
ates. 

To S. M. B. N. , while en route in Wisconsin : — • 

"My Dear M. : Your long-looked-for letter came at 
last, some time ago, making us very happy in your hap- 
piness. The sea (in sight did you say?), a pleasant 
home, kind people, dear children, and a husband one 
with you ! Surely your cup runneth over. Alas for 
lonely me ! Nothing but a car to sit in, nobody, — not 
so much as a cat, or even a mouse for company, — too 
many children, too many cares, teachers thinking I am 



THE LIEE WORK. 237 

getting to be a worldly business woman, no husband, 
not even the poor substitute of a woman one with me. 
Call up all your sympathy and pity me, — poor old 
lady! 

"Well — the news? The M. F. C. is flourishing. 
The Professor of Natural Science remains as she was, 
the most equable and admirable of helpers, — is quite 
inseparable with the Artist. . . . 

"The Professor of History is substantially the same, 
but she gains ground. She takes care of our finances 

admirably, and has boarded at all the year or 

nearly so. 

"The Professor of Literature, as doubtless she has 
informed you, has taken quarters at the College, and 
likes them very much I believe. She grows in herself, 
I think, and in the estimation of others. 

" The Professor of Latin, whom you do not know, 
is straight, good, intelligent, vegetarian, but is reserved, 
and lives too much in herself. I esteem her highly, 
but have rather given up the attempt to gain her confi- 
dence. 

"Our school, especially the upper part, has kept up 
better than last year. I have on the whole, not found 
my cares much lightened, but have no reason to com- 
plain." 

In January, 1871, the way seemed at last open 
to Miss Mortimer to realize the dream of her life, 
— to look once more upon her native land, and to 
revel amid the delights of that European civiliza- 
tion whose history and philosophy she had so long 
profoundly studied and eloquently expounded. 



238 MARY MORTIMER. 

The College was in no special need, to suffer by 
her absence ; the inspiration of her presence with- 
drawn was, to some extent, compensated by the 
regular arrival of her vivid letters to the school ; 
and the love and loyalty of pupils was stimulated 
toward both the absent Principal and the able fac- 
ulty of teachers who remained. Two of these, Miss 
Helen F. Brace, and Miss Helen M. Phillips, had 
been associated with Miss Mortimer for years, and 
were to enjoy yet other years of opportunity to 
assist in carrying out her ideals and at the same 
time of impressing their own strong individualities 
upon the school. 

It was a faithful and an industrious school family, 
— one fitted to profit by the opportunities which 
the absent traveler constantly shared with them, 
and by the kind and loving advice which perchance 
was more fully and carefully given than if she had 
remained with them. 

Miss Mortimer's practical plan of travel differed 
somewhat from the ideal of many travelers. In 
anticipation of this tour she said : " I do not wish 
to be gone more than a year, nor to spend more 
than a thousand dollars. I have no wish to travel 
incessantly, nor to see everything." After naming 
the countries and places in which she felt especial 
interest, she added, ' ' I wish to settle down in about 
four countries, England, France, Germany, and 
Italy, and live long enough to absorb something of 
the spirit of the people, and to look out upon life 
through their eyes." 



THE LIFE WORK. 239 

To one of the younger teachers, who was studying 
in Europe, Miss Mortimer wrote after her own trip 
there and return. 

" Milwaukee, Dec. 8, 1872. 

"My Dear Miss J. : . . . I am very glad for this 
widening and deepening of your life, and that you ap- 
preciate it so keenly. Let me caution you against one 
of the dangers of travelers, which is to draw too hasty 
conclusions concerning the people whom they see. 
Open yourself, as I think you are doing, in all beautiful 
charity, to the virtues of others, in whatever strange 
guise they may appear, and to customs also, and gov- 
ernments, and all sorts of things. There is so much 
for us, — who have spent all our lives in so new a coun- 
try as this, — to see and feel in so old a country as Eu- 
rope, countries that have been the theater of so varied 
and great events. 

"And one must have time for reflection and feeling, 
— time to digest, as it were, — all this which comes in 
so thick and fast upon one. I trust that you will take 
in much, not as a mathematician and logician, but as a 
child, an artist, a poet. Give rein to your imagina- 
tion, turn away from your past, and dwell with those 
who are around you in their thoughts and feelings, 
their atmosphere and their past. 

"To let it come itself and float in on one, and fill 
one, and so to live in all time and among all peoples, 
that is what we need to do. Though one cannot do 
this, yet a glimpse, an effort toward it even, is some- 
thing that will enrich life. May yours be enriched. 
"Sincerely and affectionately, 

"Your friend, 

"Mary Mortimer." 



240 MARY MORTIMER. 

Miss Mortimer's friend and former associate 
teacher at Milwaukee, Miss Huntington, was re- 
siding in Switzerland when Miss Mortimer left 
America. For this reason she traveled rapidly 
until she reached the shores of Lake Geneva, de- 
ferring a more extended tour in England until her 
return. 

The plan made before leaving home was carried 
out, but with some modifications. France, — Paris 
even — on account of war with Prussia and its con- 
sequences, was omitted from the program, and 
the time of absence was thus somewhat shortened. 
The attractions of Dresden and Berlin were reluc- 
tantly given up and travel in Central Europe sub- 
stituted. 



THE LIFE WORK. 241 



EUROPEAN CORRESPONDENCE. 



THE SPHINX. 

glad girl faces, hushed and fair, 
How shall I sing for ye ? 

For the grave picture of a Sphinx 
Is all that I can see ! 

Vain is the shining of the Land, 

And vain the de serfs art, 
The years strive with her, but she holds 

The lion in her heart. 

Baffled or fostered, patient still 

The perfect purpose clings, 
Flying or folded, strong as stone 

She wears the eagle's wings. 

Eastward she looks ; against the sky 

The eternal morning lies, 
Silent or pleading, veiled or free, 

She lifts the woman's eyes. 

1 grave girl faces, listening kind, 
Glad iv ill I sing for ye, 

While the proud figure of the Sphinx 
Is all that I can see ! 

— Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. 



17 



242 MARY MORTIMER. 

The extracts from her European correspondence 
which follow are selected not so much with a view 
to itinerary or description as to show the impres- 
sions made by these scenes on Miss Mortimer's mind 
and heart. 

" Grosvenor Hotel, London, Feb. 9, 1871. 

" Find Liverpool on your atlases, and remember there 
we are, — you as well as I, for you were to travel with 
me, — on the morning of February 7. We make a nice 
breakfast before a bright fire in our own room, on ex- 
cellent chop and delicious bread and butter, and take 
the train at 10 a. m., on one of those dark, rainy days 
for which England is proverbial. 

" We glide on through a manufacturing region in a 
northeast direction, amid many factory-like buildings, 
tall chimneys and smoke, and every now and then, little 
crowded villages of red brick houses, — not attractive. 
But then again such smooth grassy hills, such clean 
fields, such solid, arched bridges ! Everything is mas- 
sive and strong, not showy. 

" My thoughts ran back to the days of Hengist and 
Horsa, and the old Saxons, brave, sturdy, beef-eating, 
beer-drinking race. I thought what a different England 
this from that they found, and with hard and sturdy 
and long-continued blows, conquered. I seem to see 
them everywhere, — their courage and resolution, their 
love of the true and substantial. Ah ! what a changed 
England. How much man can and does do ! Ah ! if 
the doings were only always good. 

"We reached Bradford, a manufacturing town of 



THE LIFE WORK. 243 



150,000 inhabitants at 1 : 15, and received a very cor- 
dial welcome to the pleasant home of Mr. and Mrs. 
Selleck. Mr. S. is our Consul at this place. . . . 

"At 12 -.40 the next day we took the train for Lon- 
don, — your maps will show you our direction. Now 
we pass through a more agricultural country. What 
clean, beautiful fields! how carefully drained, — what 
plowing ! We see many wind-mills, which add pictur- 
esqueness to the landscape, and come to Grantham, a 
town of funny little red brick houses. Then the coun- 
try becomes hilly, — soft lawny hills, — and we pass 
through Peterboro' where is a cathedral. . . . 

"At the promised time, 6 : 30, we reach the great city. 

"There was an interesting and exciting drive of three 
miles, but London did not seem more crowded, — I 
think less noisy, — than New York. Arrived at our 
hotel, we made ready and went to tea in a spacious and 
beautiful dining room, with a bright open fire, with mir- 
rors and pillars looking like porphyry, and with lights 
gleaming from chandeliers of glittering glass. 

"We were close by Victoria station, to which we 
went next morning, bought through tickets to Basle, 
then proceeded to the American Legation to have our 
passports made right. A gentleman there told us the 
Queen was that very day to go in grand procession to 
open Parliament, and we would better go about one 
o'clock to St. James' Park, not far away, to see the sight. 
We were of course, quite delighted. . . \ As it was 
only about eleven o'clock, we hastened to Westminster 
Abbey, just around the corner, and had an hour of 
deep, grand life, which I cannot write about to-day. 



244 MARY MORTIMER. 

"On the way from the Abbey to St. James' Park we 
found ourselves in a constantly increasing crowd ; we 
had a long waiting on the spot across which Charles I. 
walked, more than two hundred years ago, to his exe- 
cution. Now we waited to see his descendant pass in 
state to the same Parliament which condemned him, — 
yet not the same, and she is its honored Queen. 

"At length, armed, handsomely-dressed guards be- 
gin to come, and the Middle Ages begin to rise from 
the past. Steel and silver, and gilt, and plumes, and 
glitter ! White, spotless dress, with steel helmets and 
armor, and black horses richly caparisoned ! These first 
troops were stationed, one by one, at short intervals 
each side of the street, right among the people who 
stood close to the horses' heels without fear. 

"Again we waited. Many policemen were about. 
The crowd was very quiet, except for conversation. 
At length, other soldiers, still more dressed, carriages, 
and richly liveried drivers and footmen, — still no 
queen. 

" Other troops, guards of honor, — and then, a close 
carriage with six horses in gorgeous trappings. « The 
Prince of Wales ! ' Again we wait. 'The Prince must 
be ready to receive the Queen,' some one says. Many 
carriages, all gold and glitter, other and still more richly 
dressed guards, — the Queen's own guards, — and at 
last, the Queen, with the Princess Louise, in a plain, 
close carriage. The window is open, however, and I 
see a rather fine head, erect, wearing a small crown. 
This carriage is drawn by eight magnificent horses, with 
gorgeous trappings and outriders, and men walking on 
either side, and then more guards, some in the dress of 



THE LIFE WORK. 245 



the days of Henry VII.,— called Henry the Seventh's 
guards, — and then the crowd follows. 

"There was no cheering, only raising of hats and 
waving of handkerchiefs, and this hardly general. An 
outburst of artillery while we were making our way 
through thronging crowds back to the Abbey, announced 
the arrival of the Queen at Parliament. We were at the 
Abbey when the procession returned. The chimes 
pealed triumphantly as the Queen passed, and the 
charming notes continued for fifteen minutes, after 
which we went in under those wonderful arches to the 
Vesper service of the English Church. How tired I 
was, and how thrilled ! How those prayers moved me, 
— and I sat and looked up, up, among the arches and 
saw the light falling through gorgeous stained windows, 
falling down, down on the monuments of the mighty 
dead whose memories, if not their spirits, haunt the 
place, and music reverberated through my heart. That 
Abbey I hope to return to, and tell you about by and by. 

"We left London at 8 : 30, sped to Dover, where I 
fancied I saw the chalk cliffs which rose before Julius 
Caesar so long ago. We stepped aboard a nice little 
steamer at eleven, and watched the moonlight on the 
sea. . . . 

"From Ostend I must leap over the miles to this 
place, Veyteaux, where, worn and weary, we arrived at 
10 p. m., the second evening from London." 

"Veyteaux, Switzerland, Feb. 17, 1871. 

" My Dear Young Ladies : " Sunday morning I first 
looked out on these mountains and this lake. How 
shall I describe them ? Before me was a chain covered 



246 MARY MORTIMER. 

with snow, glittering in exquisite silvery light. . . . 
Below lay the soft crystal lake, to the left, other 
mountains, green almost from base to summit. . . . 
This range continues around our pension, with oc- 
casional gorges through which we see other snow- 
clad mountains. . . . The light upon the mountains 
changes from silvery white to grey and golden purple. 
A speck of an island is before me in the lake, and 
nearer, the gloomy, yet beautiful castle of Chillon. 
Vines cover the hillsides, and winding paths take you 
in all directions. Cottages and more pretentious houses 
are scattered at intervals to the very top of the mount- 
ains that are green ; villages, smaller or larger, are 
scattered all along the margin of the lake, and among 
the openings in the mountains. 

"Later: We have been first to the Castle. ... I 
will not tax you or myself with writing my thoughts 
and feelings as I stood in those gloomy dungeons, and 
as to the history of the castle, I think you can find it 
in some Encyclopedia. We walked on, thankful for 
our better days. The lake was on one side of us, and 
terraced vineyards, up, up the heights on the other. 
An opening in the mountains showed us another snowy 
one, and the light from behind the mist which rested 
on the mountains lighted up the craggy heights of the 
far-away, snow-capped Alps. We sat on a stone by the 
wayside and gazed in wondering delight, and then 
walked on, past running streams coming down from the 
mountains, making charming little waterfalls. On we 
went, to the quaint old town of Villeneuve, . . . and 
returned by the Hotel Byron, a charming place over- 
looking the lake." 



THE LIFE WORK. 247 

" Feb. 21, 1871. 

"A French gentleman who came from Paris two 
days ago says they must make peace, — they have no 
army, no power to go on. . . . 

"We all propose to set out for the old city, the 
grand, the Holy City of Rome, next Tuesday, stop the 
first night at. Chambery, then over Mount Cenis to 
Turin, then to Genoa, where we propose to stop a day, 
and then on to Rome." 

"Genoa, Italy, March 3, 1871. 

"Tuesday morning we took the train at seven for 
Geneva, — mountains all the way, Alps on Alps. 

The lake retains all its beauty at Geneva, and the 
city shows to very fine advantage from it. . . . Much 
of the city is modern and handsomely built, but there 
are very quaint old parts. We rode through narrow 
and through wider streets, — one I noticed, marked 
Rue des Philosophes, and I thought of Calvin, and 
Rousseau, and many more famous men who have lived 
here. . . . 

"Poor France! Humbled, sore, rent, and riven, 
and with no fully established government ! When, how 
can she rise from this crushing fall ? What a lesson is 
she giving to the world ! Surely they that take the 
sword shall perish by the sword. Oh ! my far-away 
children, I pray you to learn the lessons set before you 
in life, and make your lives blessings to yourselves and 
others. 

"Sunday, March 5: I cannot tell you in this about 
our fearfully grand ride over Mt. Cenis, nor our journey 
thence to this wonderful old city of Genoa. . . . 



248 MARY MORTIMER. 

"We propose to take a steamer for Leghorn to-mor- 
row evening, thence by rail to Rome, which we hope to 
reach the following evening." 

" March io, 1871. 

" I left off with « Oh ! Oh ! ' which I feel inclined to 
repeat as I think of that magnificent Rhone valley. 
Some houses of refuge we noticed in some of the wild- 
est places. . . . 

" I wish it were in my power to describe that ride, — 
the mountains, the chasms so grand and fearful, on 
whose very verge we hung, then whirled along a short 
curve and rushed up in another direction, following a 
kind of zigzag road. How thrilling were the scene and 
the thoughts it excited ! How daring the genius who 
attempted the work, how patient and grand the per- 
severance that accomplished it ! We stopped often, 
apparently to get up steam for a steeper ascent. And 
the mountains still rose higher and higher, yet still the 
villages were scattered about, and men, women, chil- 
dren, and donkeys lived in them. The track of wagons 
wound along on ledges wide enough for only one 
wagon, on the edge of the most fearful precipices. Still 
we go up, up. The twilight and the shadows come, 
but then the moon rises to cast a strange, weird light 
over the scene. . . . 

"At last the mountains seemed to disappear, and a 
sea of glittering ice was around us. It was grand and 
awful — that scene — the thought of where we were, the 
wide waste of snow, the solitude, the dim, silvery light, 
the puffing engine so in contrast with the stern, uncon- 
quered, unconquerable nature. 

"There rose to my imagination dim visions of strug- 



THE LITE WORK. 249 

gles between mighty giants, — one at the center of the 
earth, holding all things with an iron grasp down, — 
another, lighter than air, resisting the giant at the cen- 
ter, resolving to lift burdens up these lofty heights, and 
the fight between the giants pictured itself dimly before 
me. 

"Aswe passed up, finding human habitations all the 
way, my wonder grew. I remembered the days of tyr- 
anny and persecution, when men were hunted like wild 
beasts, and I comprehended how these wilds were ex- 
plored. Virtue, fleeing from injustice, and crime flee- 
ing from justice have alike opened the wild places of 
the earth and been pioneers for those who came after. 
And so, good has come out of evil, the wrath of men 
has revealed the wonders of God's creation, and led to 
the union of peoples separated by what seemed to be 
impassible barriers. 

". . . Daylight soon came, and with it sunny Italy 
broke upon us. I cannot tell you the contrast between 
this ride and that of the day before. The mountains 
fade in the distance, and soft, graceful plains spread 
before us. The people,' the buildings, all things 
change. . . . 

"Turin and its surroundings impressed us as ex- 
tremely beautiful. . . . And now the Appennines ap- 
pear, and the climate changes again, grows snowy and 
chilly. At length we emerge from among rocks and 
tunnels, in Genoa, the strangest, quaintest, oldest look- 
ing city that we have seen. 

"The churches are wonderful, — most precious mar- 
bles everywhere, — crowded with statues of saints and 
angels and covered, ceilings and all, with splendid 



250 MARY MORTIMER. 

paintings, till one tires of gazing, and wonders where 
the treasure ever came from to pay the cost. Then 
there rise to me visions of oppressed down-trodden 
millions out of whom it was ground. Oh, children, be 
thankful for the broad lands your Father in Heaven has 
bequeathed you, and for freedom, and let us try every 
day to understand the true freedom better, and true 
beauty and riches. . . . 

"Old Genoa is a dream of the far past, to remain 
with me as long as I live. . . . 

"One thing which delighted me most of all I think I 
have not mentioned. It was a magnificent monument 
of Christopher Columbus. I will send you a photo- 
graph of it. There are many memorials of Columbus 
about the city. 

"At nine p. m. we sailed out of the fine harbor of 
Genoa by the light of the full moon, between the light- 
houses which have guided mariners for so many ages. 
I wish you could have seen the lighted, semi-circular 
city, rising for hundreds of feet above the level of the 
sea, gradually fading from our sight." 

"Rome, March 14, 1871. 
"(The Hereditary Prince's Birthday.) 
"My Dear Friends and Children of the House- 
hold : I have for weeks wanted to say a word to you in 
your separate capacity. Often at night I find myself 
something like a quiet homesick child who finds a heart- 
ache within and the tears ready to come, yet hardly 
knows why. You meet at table, at study hour, you tap 
at each others' doors, and at the evening hour you meet 
and sing the hymns I love so well, but see me not in 



THE LIFE WORK. 251 

my accustomed place. I trust you realize some spirit- 
ual presence, for my heart is with you, and every sight 
I see and every sound I hear is for you as well as me. 

" We are in Rome, like Paul of old, in our own hired 
house. Our rooms overlook the Piazza di Spagna. . . . 
Save our lack of language we are very comfortable now, 

— a family by. ourselves. Our Italian maid speaks a 
little English. . . . This gala-day she has hung flags 
out of all the windows, and has been teaching me to 
say, 'Viva Victor Emanuel /' I said 'No ! I shall cry, 
< < Viva liberie ' a" Italie. "' < No ! No ! ' she said, < Viva /' 
Italia libre. . . .' 

" You can hardly imagine how bright our square and 
the streets are with the tri-colored flag of Italy, — red, 
white and green, with a cross and crown in the center, 

— hanging out of all houses in each story, and there are 
red banners, edged with silver or gold. The streets are 
full of people and carriages, and an occasional laden 
donkey. . . . 

"It is springtime here. Oranges and lemons are 
hanging ripe on the trees, cacti are growing in the open 
air to the height of twenty feet or more, palm-trees, 
and tropical plants, too numerous to mention if I knew 
their names. By the time this reaches you, you will 
begin to think of spring. I hope our vines will not be 
forgotten nor neglected, and that some flowers will 
bloom before our house, and especially in all our 
hearts. You have not the climate of Italy, but your 
land is the land of hope and progress for all that. 

"And now, to one and all of you I stretch out my 
hand in loving greeting. At bed-time I shall come to 
bid you good-night. In the morning I shall be there 



252 MARY MORTIMER. 

to greet you, and at evening to ask a blessing upon 
you. . . . 

" The festal preparations still go on. If you could 
only come, we would spare you two of our windows 
and you could see these sights. . . . But my dear ab- 
sent friends, there are better things than this, and pray- 
ing for you the better things, believe me, always, 

" Your loving friend, 

"M. M." 

"Rome, April 6, 187 1. 

". . . My first view of St. Peter's and my second 
one were very painful. Its gorgeousness obtruded itself 
upon me most. The lofty arched ceiling and domes are 
nearly covered with gilding, and the effect, to me, is 
neither beautiful nor dignified. ... It is difficult, for 
us probably impossible, to realize its vast size and 
height. The whole seemed to me a grand display of 
pomp and power. . . . 

"There is a statue of Christ, wonderful in majestic 
serenity and love, at sight of which one remembers that 
His kingdom is not of this world. He pronounced the 
meek, the poor in spirit, the mourner, the pure in heart, 
the persecuted for righteousness' sake, — not the proud, 
the splendid, the rich, — to be blessed. . . . 

"What a mingling of splendor and superstition is St. 
Peter's. There seems to me the utmost violence done 
to good sense and taste. . . . 

" In these churches what impresses me as most ad- 
mirable is that the poorest and meanest seem quite at 
home in them. . . . 

" We went yesterday (Holy Wednesday) to the Church 



THE LIFE IVOR A'. 253 

of St. John Lateran. . . . You have heard of the 
Sacred Stairs. . . . Two fine statues at the foot of 
the stairs impressed me very much. . . . We stood 
and watched the scene. ... A mother, with a son 
about seventeen and a daughter of seven or eight, came 
in and knelt down and began the ascent. I watched 
with much interest. The little girl bowed her head to 
the steps and kissed them again and again, and the young 
man too. Slowly saying their prayers they went their 
painful way, and I tried to enter into their conscious- 
ness. They believed these were the real stairs up which 
on this day Christ, the Holy One, went to suffer for us, 
and now they, in love and hope and humility, would 
follow, expressing that love by kissing the ground 
on which he trod, that humility by going on bended 
knee, and their longing desire for the benefit of his suf- 
fering by lingering on those steps of humiliation to 
Him. I could have knelt and gone up myself, and I 
am glad of the vision which helped me to a charitable 
view of what seems to us a superstitious observance. . . . 

" Westminster Abbey was to me grand, awe-inspir- 
ing, — these churches are gorgeous, rich, filling the ob- 
server with admiration at the treasures of art in them, 
and with sorrow and mortification before the emblems 
and services of superstition. 

"Now I want to take you back to old Rome again. 
Last evening we went to see the Colosseum by moon- 
light. The sky was without a cloud. We rode past the 
ruins of the Forum and the Palace of the Caesars, past 
columns and arches. How weird and grand they 
looked in the moonlight ! How noble and beautiful 
this grand old monument of ancient times, — the de- 



254 MARY MORTIMER. 

facements not visible by the dimmer light, the beauty 
and picturesqueness more impressive. 

"We climbed up many stairs. . . . The sight when 
we reached the highest platform was grand beyond all 
description. The size and grandeur of the building 
were, in some good degree, apparent now. 

"Where are the men who built it, and those who re- 
joiced in its bloody pleasures? Echo only answers 
'Where?' It stands a type of pride and power, of 
human skill and human hate. Over it now broods 
silence and decay, but also God's canopy of blue, and 
that beautiful moon which shines the same as in other 
days when all was wild commotion here. . . . 

" O my children ! I wish it were in my power to give 
you any adequate picture of that glorious scene, and of 
the thought and feeling it should excite, but you have 
imaginations, and the best part of the scene is with you 
every full moon. 

"Look at a picture of the Colosseum, try to appre- 
ciate its size and then its history, and imagine your- 
selves on one of its highest tiers of seats, with your sky 
over you and your moon the same as this shining upon 
us, and see the lights and shades, the circling seats 
crowded with eager faces, the troubled scene below ; 
listen to the shrieks of the victims, the roar of wild 
beasts, and the mad cries of the excited thousands 
above, and then let your thoughts pass down the ages 
to the time when the cross took possession of this place 
of persecution ; — pass on to the present, when it stands 
in majestic silence under that soft light falling on 
Crumbling arch and tower, pouring a flood of silver 
light through arches and over broken moss-grown walls, 



THE LIFE WORK. 255 



lighting up the cross and the chapels still there, and re- 
member that beyond lies the city with other ruins, and 
its palaces and temples, and still beyond, fading away 
in the distance, the Roman Campagna filled with ruins 
of temples and palaces, aqueducts and tombs. 

^Evening: I have been again to St. Peter's, and I 
do not like what I have written of it. The impression 
it makes upon me remains much the same, but the 
church impresses me more as grand every time I see it. 

. . Hundreds of people were there to-day. ... I 
fell into the spirit of the scene in some small degree, 
and hoped a blessing might come from Him who hear- 

eth prayer." 

" Rome, April n, 1871. 

" (This letter is for the girls and children ; you may 
let the older ones hear it) 

<< My Dear Children : Your two packages of letters 
came yesterday just as E. and I were going out to see 
the Mamertine prison, which (if you do n't know) dates 
away back to the time of Tarquinius Priscus, almost 
2500 years ago. I had a very nice time reading your 
letters, I assure you, though' I had to put on my glasses 
for some of them. 

"Altogether they were very nice notes, and I am 
much obliged to the writers for them. One girl sent 
over the ocean all the way to Italy 'wright' for 'right.' 
That was a pity, was n't it ? . . . I hope the W. B. 
G. G. Society will do all it promises, especially for the 
little girl who says she is not 'so awful bad as she 
was,' and for the other one who is growing better be- 
cause she has begun < to-day by not whispering.' 

"Old Rome, you know, was heathen, worshiping 



256 MARY MORTIMER. 

Jupiter, Mars, Apollo, and a host of fanciful beings. 
Old Rome persecuted and massacred the Christians by 
thousands. Then the power in Rome became Chris- 
tian, and Rome became the Capital of the Christian 
world, its bishop the supreme ruler of the Roman terri- 
tory, and the head of the Church in all Christendom. 
It was suitable then and grand to indicate here in this 
state .ruled by priests that they, having been able by 
Christ's power to take all from heathen Rome, gave all 
to Him. Everywhere you are reminded of the Rome 
of the Caesars, but still more that that has passed away, 
and that He who was despised and crucified by the 
authority of these same Caesars, now rules over all, and 
Rome, as you know, has come to be called the Holy 
City. . . . 

" However, this city does not seem holy to me, but 
very unholy. The good and evil are fearfully mingled 
here, and the power of the church seems to be falling. 

"The pope no longer rules Rome. . . . The king is 
to make this city his capital and remove his court here 
in June, and great changes may be coming. 

" We went yesterday to the Appian Way. . . . From 
the Baths of Caracalla ... we looked back from the 
high walls to Rome, which now you must do. There 
it lay with its domes and towers, its arches and obelisks 
and ruins, and its seven hills, — grand, brave, devout, 
mean, cowardly, infidel Rome, — the Sphinx, telling 
riddles to all the world, but neither the world nor my 
little girls have guessed them yet. If you do not know 
about the Sphinx and the riddles, you must find out, 
for I cannot afford time to tell you. The W. B. G. G. 
Society can investigate the subject. . . . 



THE LIFE WORK. 257 

"Perhaps you would like to enquire how my favor 
ites, the donkeys, are getting on. They are not quite 
so nice and interesting, nor so many, as in Genoa, but 
I see the poor patient little things laden with straw, 
wood, bags, men, tubs and baskets, — or drawing big 
carts or funny little ones, with two or three large men 
in them, or a load of goods. I want to cry, Shame on 
you / and go and pet the donkeys and give them some- 
thing to eat." 

To Mrs. O. H. W. : — 

"As yet, nothing interests me like Italy; there, 
Rome most of all. Tell Mr. W. it is the place to exer- 
cise the imagination. It holds me fast, stirs me, asks 
me endless questions, sings vague, dim songs in my ears. 
It sets all history, and man in his double nature of ma- 
terial and spiritual, of angel and demon, before you as 
no other place can, I think, . . . 

11 I have hope for Italy that she will do in the future 
at least as well as other nations. Would that under her 
beautiful skies, amid the graceful vines and flowers, with 
the thrilling past everywhere speaking to her, she might 
do better, and show us what men and nations ought to 
be, as she has shown us what they ought not to be. I 
hope you will come here as a family, and that you will 
not let anything interfere with your all getting the po- 
etry and the moral lesson of grand, wicked, brave, im- 
becile, devout, frivolous, beautiful, deformed old 
Rome." 

In soliloquy, Miss Mortimer wrote after her re- 
turn to America : — 

18 



258 MARY MORTIMER. 



"Some wanderings up and down the older world 
than ours, especially a sojourn of two months in Rome, 
have so stirred me that I wish to speak of it. The in- 
describable contrast offered by all I saw as compared 
with what I had seen, seized on my imagination, op- 
pressed me with vague, mysterious yearnings. I wan- 
dered up and down its streets, went into its churches 
and galleries, gazed upon its monuments and ruins. I 
am not artistic, — could not properly appreciate the 
wonderful art of the old city, but there came to me a 
dim and indistinct feeling, rather than an intellectual 
perception, that something which I must find was hid- 
den under all this that appeared, and one day as I 
mused, the old Sphinx story came to me as a sort of 
revelation. I saw the old Theban Sphinx, sitting on 
the highest of the seven hills, at her old business of 
propounding riddles and crushing those who cannot or 
will not answer. And the Sphinx seized me, thrilled 
me, startled me with questions I was in no condition to 
answer. Rome, with its wondrous monuments, its still 
more wondrous ruins, every hour grew more impress- 
ive, more mysterious. I could not think, — I could 
only feel, and dream vague dreams, but the Sphinx 
would not leave me. Before fountains presided over 
by Greek gods, beside Roman arches surmounted by 
the cross and inscribed Pontifex Max., the Sphinx held 
the traveler fast and shrieked in her ear, What is 
this ? " 

"Florence, April 30, 187 1. 

"I thought I would write a little about Florence to- 
day, but Rome clings to me. I wish I could return 
there to-morrow. It lingers in my heart and memory, a 



THE LIFE WORK. 259 



dream, dim, dirty, priest-ridden, beggarly, yet inde- 
scribably fascinating,— a myth, a poem. 
"I cannot bear to say good-by to Rome ! " 

"May 12. 
"I have already said Florence is beautiful. We were 
more than ever impressed with this yesterday when we 
went into the royal gardens, and viewed the city and 
surrounding country. . . . These gardens must be hun- 
dreds of acres in extent. There are lofty heights and 
deep valleys, open spaces and secluded nooks, and the 
wildest, darkest, most secret forests, hedges of roses, 
and a great variety of flowers, beautiful and magnificent 
trees in endless variety, and much and expressive stat- 
uary. . . . 

"We went on, far up, sometimes by winding paths, 
sometimes by steps, and came to such beautiful out- 
looks ! Florence with its domes and towers and pal- 
aces, and the Arno, lay below, and around on the 
heights, lovely villas, and beyond, and higher still, the 
beautiful mountains under the softest and deepest blue 
haze,— over all, the most- exquisite sky, blue, with 
bright fleecy clouds. 

" The sky is so beautiful everywhere that I ever lived! 
I cannot see that it is much more so here, but I think it 
is, — a little." 

"My Dear Pupils : ... My last date to you was 
June 3, from Florence, and now I must write Aug. 21, 
in London. Shall I give you a little sketch of the in- 
tervening time ? Not many days after my last letter, 
Miss Carrie, Nellie, and I took the train late one even- 
ing for Venice. It was a gala day in Florence, and 



260 MARY MORTIMER. 

there was a splendid illumination. The Gothic roof of 
the great Cathedral shone with innumerable lights. It 
was a glorious sight, but the cars soon took us from it, 
and we sped on through tunnels and villages and cities, 
to that romantic one of which you have all dreamed. I 
cannot stop now to tell you of its gondolas, its gorgeous 
palaces and churches, its glittering spires and columns, 
its wonderful square of St. Mark, its Rialto bridge, or 
its ' Bridge of Sighs ' ; its prisons or its pictures, or our 
charming sails, but I will say we enjoyed Venice ex- 
ceedingly. Next to Rome, it was to me the most inter- 
esting place I have seen. . . . 

"We had stayed longer in Florence than we intended, 
and so felt obliged to hasten from Venice, ten days 
after we arrived. A beautiful, yet sad night it was when 
we went and took our last look at the brilliant square, 
and then, accompanied by Miss H. and S., went on 
board the steamer bound for Trieste. Leaving Venice 
was leaving so much, not only itself, with all its present 
interest, and its past, but for us, it was leaving Italy 
and our friends, and going forth to a strange land, with 
our tongues tied and our ears stopped. . . . Our sail, 
however, was quite charming. We reached Vienna 
without any serious difficulty. ... It is, you know, a 
large, grand city. It abounds in beautiful parks and 
gardens, of which I have brought away very pleasant 
memories, especially of the gardens of Maria Theresa, 
a little out of the city, and also of the beautiful spire of 
St. Stephens, and of its cheerful, social people. . . . 

"From Munich we passed on through Augsburg and 
Ulm to Stuttgardt. Here Miss W., whom some of you 
will remember, joined us, and persuaded me to go back 



THF LIFE WORK. 261 

to Munich and thence to Oberammergau to see the 
1 Passion Play.' . . . 

" On to Heidelberg, and then, through Mannheim and 
Darmstadt to Mayence, . . . where we were soon aboard 
the Rhine steamer. I do not think the river and its 
banks any more beautiful by nature than our own Hud- 
son, but when you take into account art and history, it 
is quite another thing. Its hill-tops are surmounted by 
ancient ruins, its banks are lined with historic old 
towns, and the valleys among its mountains are full of 
romantic interest. At ten in the evening we reached 
Cologne. . . . 

" Our first interest after breakfast was the Cathedral, 
the wonderful, the beautiful Cathedral, — by far the 
most so to me of any that I have seen. One might 
very well be excused for shedding tears of rapture, 
while sitting under its glorious arches and listening to 
the reverberations of its grand organ. After the Cathe- 
dral, I could feel no further interest in Cologne. At 
three we left for Aix-la-Chapelle, . . . where we went 
to the old church of Charlemagne which, though not so 
beautiful, interested me, even more than the church of 
Cologne, on account of its historical remains. . . . 
The priests were at the altar, in a new part, gorgeous 
with painted windows, and above was a fine organ well 
played. I stood and listened, leaning against one of 
those old pillars, and the spirit of the past came down 
upon me. A thousand years ago Charlemagne built 
this church, and here he and his mailed knights as- 
sembled to worship the same God and Saviour whom 
we worship, and ever since prayers have been uttered 
and songs of praise chanted here. Here the great 



262 MARY MORTIMER. 

Emperor was buried, clad in armor studded with gold 
and jewels, seated on a stone chair or throne covered 
with plates of gold, and with a crown of gold on his 
head. In 1165, this throne was taken from the vault, 
and the emperors of Germany have been crowned upon 
it from that day to the present century. . . . 

"Brussels is sometimes described as a small Paris, 
and as we decided not to visit the latter city [devastated 
by the war and the commune] we were a little the more 
anxious to come to Brussels. Some of the churches 
there are quite gorgeous, especially with beautiful win- 
dows, but they scarcely interested me so much as the 
square where Egmont and Home were executed in 1568 
by order of Alva, the cruel governor of Philip II. of 
Spain. On the spot where this crime was committed, 
in front of the Maison du Roi and opposite the Hotel de 
Ville, one of the finest public buildings in Europe, now 
stands, a noble monument to these martyrs to their 
country. [Since removed to the Petit Sablon. — Ed.] 
I stood beside it, and walked twice around the grand 
old square, amid the busy throng, trying to catch the 
spirit of that past when tyranny and freedom had their 
deadly strife. . . . 

"We took the train there for Antwerp, of which I 
shall not write now, remained there two days, and then 
took a steamer for this largest and richest city of the 
world." 

To M. B. N. : — 

" Stuttgardt, July 15, 1871. 

". . . I wish I could tell you in intelligible terms 
what interests me most. The old Sphinx and Rome 
have become strangely commingled and they haunt me. 



THE LIFE WORK. 263 

Nothing thoroughly interests me since Rome. It holds 
all that other places have and more, and much more im- 
pressively. Imperial Rome and papal Rome stand 
there together, alike in their vital spirit, but very unlike 
in their outer manifestation. Power, grandeur, self- 
gratification, they both sought and gained, but papal 
Rome held a deeper truth than the other, and every- 
where worked on man through his religious nature. 

" It seems to me a new and most impressive book 
may be written on the ' Evidences of Christianity found 
in Rome.' Honest men who had been more divinely 
taught than by the Theban Sphinx first told the story of 
the Crucified, of divine and saintly love and suffer- 
ing, but the Alexanders, and Julius and the Leos, — 
men who cared only for what the old Caesars sought, — 
continued to have that story told, spent millions to 
have it told ! What cared the Roman princes and po- 
tentates for Him who died for them, for saints and 
martyrs whose lives were a constant reproach to them ! 
But a divine instinct forced them to perpetuate the truth. 
They knew that man could be satisfied and governed 
through his religious nature as through nothing else. 
How could this be, only as it is his deepest and truest 
nature ? 

"St. Peter's, a gorgeous temple built to manifest the 
pomp and power of papal Rome, stands to-day, it seems 
to me, its true type. The Crucified and the cross meet 
you on every side, and that type of gentle, beautiful 
womanhood, the Virgin Mother, and saints and mar- 
tyrs; but their spirit is not the spirit of the place; rather 
the marble and gold and precious stones, the crowns 
and keys and thrones and popes in priestly panoply. 

"The Colosseum with its thrilling exhibition of intel- 



264 MARY MORTIMER. 



lectual as well as material power . . . speaks of imperial 
Rome, and hundreds of acres of ruined palaces, trium- 
phal columns and arches, testify to the power and grand- 
eur of that nation which was conquered by Christianity, 
— and even false and cruel men found this to be the most 
powerful Name in which to hold Rome and go forth to 
fresh conquests. 

"I cannot tell you how it impresses me, and most of 
all that Rome, through all the ages having answered the 
Sphinx-riddle of life by declaring power and self-grati- 
fication to be its end and aim, has proved in the most 
fearful agonies and destructions, the utter falsity of the 
answer. 

"Yet all the nations, regardless of the lesson that 
Rome is shouting in their dull ears, give the same an- 
swer to-day, and the churches, alas ! too nearly agree 
with the nations." 

"Oberammergau, July 29, 187 1. 
"... I wish I could tell you what a ride we had, 
how glorious the mountains were, what a nice talk I 
had with the English ladies about England, how good 
and honest our driver was ! At length ... a cone- 
shaped rock rose before us above the surrounding 
mountains, and the driver soon pointed around it and 
said, ' There is Oberammergau.' 

"It was a rest to one's spirit to be in this simple vil- 
lage where everybody seemed to be honest, and to 
be unconcerned about the conventionalities of this 
world. . . . 

"Once in ten years the Play is given every Sunday 
through the summer, and it has been kept up for two 



THE LIFE WORK. 205 

hundred years. ... It is very wonderful, considering 
that it is all managed and performed by simple villagers. 
The characters are very finely maintained, many of 
them, the Christ most of all, and the scene of the cru- 
cifixion is fearfully real. 

" Our host was one of the Roman soldiers, and the 
next house where we took our dinners, furnished Pilate, 
John, Mary the Mother, and one of the principal sing- 
ers, yet so quiet are they that the evening before, the 
Mary and the singer went with us to a Tyrolean con- 
cert. . . . 

" They go through the performance as a religious serv- 
ice. It did not excite me so much as I expected. The 
simplicity and sincerity of the people saved the exhibi- 
tion from being repulsive, . . . but the exhibition did 
not move me so much as the story does without the 
exhibition." 

" London. — British and S. Kensington Museums. 

" Policemen and others guard these treasures but 
place no hindrance in the way of men, women, and chil- 
dren going anywhere and everywhere, free of charge. 
King George IV., of whom f do not remember to have 
heard any good before, gave a large and valuable li- 
brary to the Museum. I was glad to know it, though 
perhaps it was no great sacrifice to him. There, that 
suspicion is mean ! Let us rejoice in any good we see 
in any one, and give full credit for it, too." 

" WINSDOR CASTLE. 

". . . Around the banqueting table were portraits 
of many kings of England which seemed to me very 
like the characters we learn of them in history. Charles I. 
does not look like a true man, and his son ! 



266 MARY MORTIMER. 

" George III., from whom the American colonies re- 
volted, looks no wiser than any American critic would 
represent him, and his son looks the profligate dandy 
that he was. Alas ! for royalty. It makes but a poor 
figure when the trappings are laid aside. . . . 

"st. george's chapel. 

11 Saw the tomb of Princess Charlotte, the daughter of 
George IY ? through whose early death Victoria came to 
be Queen of England. ... I did not at first like the 
statuary group, but it rather grew upon me. . . . The 
church did not please us especially. It is quite large, 
but there are only a few benches in the main body of 
the church. Beyond, almost shut off from it, seems to 
be the place for the court to worship, and this is very 
rich with carving and armorial bearings, and besides 
this, over the seats of the nobility are their banners, and 
I was disturbed that in the House of God this poor 
earthly rank must obtrude itself." 

"Oxford, Sept. 22, 1871. 

" . . . In one of the great general libraries, — 
each college has its own besides, — I saw 65 large folio 
volumes of catalogues ! . . . The Oxford of to-day is a 
different Oxford from that of the days of Alfred or 
Elizabeth, — and England is so different from what it 
would have been had there been no Oxford ! 

"This room of which I have spoken was used for 
the sittings of Parliament during some of the troublous 
times in English history. Now it is a hall for examina- 
tions, and back of it is the room where the officers 
of the College meet to do business, and to confer di- 
plomas on the students. At one end, under a canopy 



THE LIFE WORK. 267 

and on a raised platform, the Chancellor is seated and 
below him the Vice Chancellor and the Proctors. The 
candidates for degrees wait in a room beyond till called 
for, when they pass in one by one to the Chancellor. 
There is no one great day of conferring degrees, but 
several times each term degrees are conferred upon 
those who can pass the required examinations. 

"We visited a very pleasant and intelligent family in 
York, and a lad of eighteen, who is preparing for the 
University perhaps, asked me if girls studied Algebra 
in America. When I answered, they do, he wanted to 
know what proportion of them. He declared that vul- 
gar fractions is the extent of a girl's ambition in Eng- 
land, and his mother joined in the assurance that they 
had no educated female teachers, — yet I see, even from 
the admissions of this family as well as many other 
signs, that all this is passing away. Schools for girls 
are taking a higher stand, and women are waking up to 
their own necessities and capacities. We visited a 
public school which interested me much. The gentle- 
man at its head is evidently a fine teacher and has his 
heart in his work. His boys recited Mental Arithmetic 
with great fluency, but in other things I thought did 
not excel our girls. 

"YORK CATHEDRAL. 

"We will walk down the nave to the grand entrance 
and view from there the whole length of the Cathedral. 
It is wonderful, the grandeur and impressiveness of that 
long series of arches. . . . Our guide took us into the 
chapter-house, which is high and large and grand, and 
ornamented with carved leaves. He said he believed 
all English leaves were represented there, and we walked 



268 MARY MOR TIMER. 

around the spacious room and failed to find two leaves 
alike. 

"The old workers on these cathedrals put their souls 
into their work in a wonderful manner. . . . We take 
a seat in view of the grand old columns and arches, as 
the morning service begins. As the beautiful tones of 
the organ and the well-trained choir swell up through the 
lofty arches, we remember that this same service has 
been chanted here, day by day, for ages, and a flood of 
feeling comes over us. How many have sat, as we now 
sit, and listened to these prayers and psalms and les- 
sons, — how many have lifted up their souls in this serv- 
ice to Him who alone is able to bestow upon us the 
blessing we need ! Surely these prayers have been an- 
swered, and though there has been much evil, yet not so 
much as there would have been had these prayers not 
been uttered. 

"I visited to-day, in Edinburgh, a school of 1300 
girls. ... It was very suggestive." 

"Windermere, Oct. 19, 1871. 

" My Dear Pupils : I sit down to write my last letter 
from this side the great ocean. It is nine months 
since I left you. . . . 

"As my last letter stated, we left the beautiful and 
interesting city of Edinburgh on Monday morning, — 
Edinburgh, with its castle on the rock, guarded by 
Highlanders in full Highland costume, and its palace of 
Holyrood sacred to the memory of the unfortunate and 
not good Queen Mary, and all its other treasures. . . . 
We sped along toward the old city of Carlisle. . . . 
The old Norman pillars and arches of the Cathedral 
here are strong enough, apparently, to stand a thousand 



THE LIFE WORK. 269 



or two thousand years more. ... We steamed off 
again for Keswick through the misty, drizzling rain. 
... At the Tower Hotel we ordered tea on our arrival, 
and it was brought into a charming room down stairs, 
— the nicest, cosiest tea! and we ate from the most 
delicate china by the help of the brightest silver. After 
tea we entertained ourselves with books from the book- 
cases, containing the finest of prints,— after which we 
went to our luxurious beds. The next morning ... we 
arranged to go by row-boat up the Derwentwater to the 
falls of Lodore. . . . Soft and clear the lake lay before 
us, clothed with islands rejoicing in the beauty of au- 
tumn tints, and set in a frame of multiform mountains, 
down which, here and there, rushed a silvery cascade. 
How beautiful it was I cannot tell you ! . . . 

a\v e left the boat near Lodore and passed over a lit- 
tle bridge and soon found ourselves before the rushing, 
roaring cataracts which Southey has described so well. 
Returning to our pleasant hotel, we bade our 
friends good-by, ... the coach appeared, and as be- 
fore in Edinburgh, we mounted to the top. Away we 
went, past the Derwentwater, past Thirlmere, past St. 
John's Vale, and the mountains, Helvellyn, and many 
others, past Grasmere, a beautiful lake and village 
nestled in a charming valley, and Rydal Water, where 
Wordsworth and Coleridge lived and dreamed and 
wrote. A part of this scene we saw in the sunlight, 
and really it seems to me, when we combine it with its 
associations, the world holds few places more attract- 
ive. But soon the clouds gathered again and the rain 
began to fall. I pulled the cape of my cloak over my 
head, and the apron of the coach over my lap, and 



270 MARY MORTIMER. 

concluded I would not be disturbed. Miss Thurston 
went inside the coach and we rode on to Ambleside. 
It seems to me the poets must have given the names 
here', they are so musical. In less than an hour after 
the coach left us at the station in Windermere, we were 
comfortably settled in lodgings. After dinner we 
passed through a winding way to an eminence which 
overlooks this, the largest of the lakes, and all the 
country round. The gray, leaden mist hung over all, 
yet it was indescribably beautiful. Ah ! what pains, so 
to speak, our Father has taken to give us joy, to elevate 
and refine us. Surely we may never neglect the beauti- 
ful. Study your lessons in the exact sciences, — we can 
never overrate their importance, but do not fail to culti- 
vate your tastes and imaginations. Admire, love, re- 
joice in all beautiful things. . . . 

"Surely if poetry were in one, these scenes would de- 
velop it. . . . We have resolved to sail up and down 
the lake, rain or shine, to-morrow. ..." 

"Liverpool, Oct. 22. 

"We sailed all around the lake from Bowness to 
Lake Side, where we stopped a few minutes, then sailed 
the whole length of the lake to Ambleside where we 
landed, and rode and walked to Rydal Water, . . . went 
into Rydal Church, and then to Rydal Mount, the home 
for thirty-seven years of Wordsworth, of which I will 
try to tell you at some future time. 

"In two weeks I hope, through the blessing of our 
Father, to step on our own shores, which, after all, I 
would not exchange for any foreign land. I do not 
think I shall wish ever again to take so long a journey, 
though this has been, on the whole, very charming, and 



THE LIFE WORK. 271 

has, I trust, done me good, and you, too. The rest I 
must tell you face to face. 

"I have not told you how for nearly two weeks our 
hearts have been aching for the suffering north and 
south of you [by fire], but now let me express the ear- 
nest hope that you are every one studying what you 
can do for the poor sufferers. We must not stop, — all 
the winter we must stretch out our hands and divide our 
little or much. I fear the sufferers by the Wisconsin 
fires are not thought of much, because of the greatness 
of the Chicago disaster, but Milwaukee, of course, will 
consider them. How many of you may be mourning 
the loss of friends or worldly goods, I hardly dare try 
to think. . . . 

" There is much beautiful sympathy manifested here. 
A notice was given out in church this morning that a 
collection for the Chicago sufferers would be taken up 
next Sunday. 

"That He who. loveth us with an everlasting love 
may have us in His keeping and bring us together in 
peace to rejoice together in His loving-kindness is the 
prayer of 

"Your very affectionate teacher and friend, 

"M. M." 

To her associate teachers, Miss Mortimer wrote 
words of sympathy and suggestion from London 
and elsewhere : — 

" Of your work I need say nothing, — you appreciate 
its magnitude, its interest, its difficulty. . . . You are 
every one noble and true women, with earnest purposes 
to do your work, to fulfill your life's duties well and 



272 MARY MORTIMER. 

faithfully. Life is a difficult path for us all, and a 
teacher's life is full of trial as well as joy. We need 
sympathy more than any words of mine can express. 
So I beg you will meet often together, and be in affec- 
tionate sympathy. . . . 

" Do not study and be anxious all the time ; be so- 
cial, cheerful, go out, walk, and have plenty of recrea- 
tion and sleep. Do not try to think how much you 
can require of the girls, — we require too much, — but 
see that your requirements are reasonable and then 
insist they shall be met. . . . It is a great danger, 
especially of zealous young teachers, to over-work 
themselves and their pupils. Science is infinite and 
there is infinite temptation to launch out on this side 
and that, to add more and more every year to the 
lessons. Resist this temptation. The more you know 
the better, if you lose not that which is more valuable, 
as health, vigor, cheerfulness ; but you need not try to 
make young girls know it all, — they are not equal to 
it." 

As in every large city with pupils drawn chiefly 
from its homes, social gaiety in Milwaukee was a 
temptation to the College students in their later 
years of study. The College catalogues and circu- 
lars sometimes refer to this, and Miss Mortimer's 
kindly and earnest expostulations were to some 
extent effectual with both mothers and pupils. 

To the outgoing class of 1871 she wrote from 
Florence : — 

"My Dear Faithful and Kind Children: How 
shall I ever requite you for all the pleasant and loving 



THE LIFE WORK 273 



memories you will leave for me in the very walls and 
atmosphere of the old College ? How shall I tell you 
the sadness of the thought that I shall meet you no 
more in the daily intercourse of my school-life, that I 
may not even witness your departure from those halls? 
Still more, what shall I say for my last message while 
still the golden cord which binds us together is un- 
broken, — and how shall I say it? 

"I know it is very easy to excite your emotions in 
these days of change and parting, very easy for you to 
make resolutions to leave that which is weak and evil 
behind you, and go forth to fight a noble battle, to 
climb glorious heights. But when you shall have 
passed the threshold of your womanhood, and school 
and its lessons shall grow dim with distance, when the 
cares and noise, the ambitions and allurements of this 
world shall be upon you, then it will be so easy to for- 
get the resolution, and you will find that the battle of 
life is but just begun. . . . 

"Your connection with school is closed with a social 
gathering. That is a sort of link joining school to the 
outer world for you, — a doorway from one to the 
other. Already the temptations of the outer world will 
be upon you ; the noble resolutions, the tearful long- 
ings for a spiritual life, the pain of the parting will be 
fading. Flattering attentions and youthful dreams will 
carry you away. You cannot well help it, but, my dear 
children, the morrow will come, a day of weary re-ac- 
tion when some of you will long for rest and quiet, 
when all of you, I think, will feel, more or less, in a 
maze, and have a painful sense of responsibility in the 
future and unfitness to meet it. 



19 



274 MARY MORTIMER. 



"Then, — may I beg of you, — go alone with God, 
who alone can fit you for life, and look to the founda- 
tions on which you stand ; see what you have of the best 
lessons of the past. Make a few notes with pen or 
pencil for the sake of forcing yourselves to clearness 
and definiteness, and, in the full consciousness that 
school and the regular set lessons which demanded all 
your time are gone by, that your responsible woman- 
hood has begun, renew your best resolutions. . . . 

" Almost every conscientious youth is disappointed, 
often grievously so, with the first year after leaving 
school. They probably are least so who go forth to 
earnest responsible labor, and I congratulate those of 
you who, from choice or force of circumstances, shall 
do this. 

" Some of you will have enough to task all your ener- 
gies at home ; some will probably teach. Be grateful 
for these helps to an earnest and useful life. . . . Oth- 
ers society will claim. You know, perhaps better than 
I, how young ladies thus situated spend their time and 
energies. Alas ! for most of such, society is a weak, 
vain round. . . . 

"Others will be very industrious. But, dear children, 
more is requisite. We must be industrious, and our 
industry must bring forth good fruit which shall de- 
velop and feed ourselves and those around us. You 
will all probably find enough to do, — the question is 
whether it will be profitable, soul-satisfying work. 

"You know all the world condemn the usages and 
principles of society, yet are usually governed by them. 
In all earnestness I put the question to you — What will 
you do ? 



THE LIFE WORK. 275 

"You will feel that you cannot stem the tide and 
stand alone, resisting fashion and extravagance. But 
you can be the last, rather than the first, to follow a 
bad fashion ; you can refrain from an excessive follow- 
ing ; if your neighbor has been extravagant, you can be 
less instead of more so. When late hours are fashion- 
able, if you have not strength or think it not courteous 
to go home at proper hours, you can, at least, go with 
the first, instead of the last. 

"You can rise above that weak and foolish pride 
which incites one to do inconvenient, uncomfortable 
and evil things, to prove that one knows the fashions of 
society and is a fashionable and cultivated lady. 

" Or if this is too much, you can give some faint in- 
fluence to the better way, by being slow to follow evil, 
by being in haste to follow good fashions, by giving 
your influence to encourage those who dare to do right 
and be sensible, in spite of fashion. 

"The time hastens when a terrible sifting shall come. 
He whose right it is to reign shall come and separate 
those who love this world from those who love Him 
and His truth, and many who now fancy themselves His 
will not be accepted. . . . 

" How fearful that we who have named the Name of 
Christ . . . should so live that we cannot be distin- 
guished from this vain and evil world, — its practices 
we follow, its spirit guides us. How much, let us each 
look into our own heart, and see, and seek for deliver- 
ance. . . . 

"And now I want to urge upon your affections and 
your best efforts, the fostering mother you leave. 
Nearly or quite one hundred children, when you depart, 



276 MARY MORTIMER. 

will she have sent forth, with such honor as she can be- 
stow. She stands where light and help are needed ; 
she needs help that she may impart to others. Her 
children can give it better than any one else. They 
will be epistles from her, by which she will be 
judged. 

"You will help us also by often coming to see us. I 
cannot tell you how pleasant it is for us to see the old 
faces, and you too will need this connection with the 
past. Come and hear the old lessons for your own 
sakes; come to gladden the hearts of your old teach- 
ers ; come to manifest your interest in your old school- 
mates, and in the new ones who shall come. Exert a 
wise and powerful outside influence as you may, in our 
behalf. 

"I ask this of you for your own sakes, for that 
of Milwaukee and the West, for the sake of woman, 
and of education. Let our College be a tangible 
bond of union for us, through which we will work 
for the cause of education and the progress of 
society. . . . 

"Keep up some intellectual pursuit, each by herself, 
and also socially, keep bright the bond which binds you 
eleven together. . . . 

"And now, dear children, good-by and good cheer 
for the future. Be not too much lifted up with high 
hopes if you have them ; be not too much cast down 
if care and sorrow come upon you. 

"Look up and trust. God is able, and will, out of 
your weakness bring forth strength, out of your dark- 
ness bring forth light, and you shall go forth, if you 
trust Him, to win ever nobler and more blessed vie- 



THE LIFE WORK. 277 



tories. I am happy, my dear children, to send you 
forth, despite the sadness of parting. 
" God bless you always, now and ever. 

"Your loving and faithful friend, 

"M. M." 

No one was ever more staunch and uncom- 
promising in fidelity to principles than Miss Morti- 
mer, but she was a practical philanthropist who 
believed that it is better to attain the best that can 
be reached in following principle, rather than to 
lose all by insisting on standards impossible of 
attainment for actions which are not sinful per se ; 
and she recognized the fact that in many things 
society must be elevated, so to speak, by a set of 
screws, and not hoisted by a derrick. 

To the undergraduates of the school she also 
wrote a message at this time, in which the following 
passages occur : — 

" Our life is as if we were chained to an ever moving 
wheel. If we move along every instant, as we can and 
should, the chain will not bruise or even press us, but if 
we fall behind, the chain will become heavy, burden- 
some, will press our flesh, drag us, bruise us, and if still 
we fail to rise and hasten with energy and cheerful alac- 
rity on our appointed course, we shall be dragged on 
none the less, bruised, faint, and bleeding, it may be, 
but with the wheel we must go. Would that I could 
make you see and feel it all before any more years flee 
past you. 

"It shall be noble and blessed to go on hour by 



278 MARY MORTIMER. 

hour beside that wheel, the chain which binds you to it 
shall become a silken cord, leading you ever to glorious 
victory, to green pastures and beside still waters, if with 
cheerful alacrity you keep pace with it, but if you fail, 
then shall come weariness, wreck, and ruin. 

"And now a word as to traveling. Some of you 
seem to have grown a little excited about it of late. 
There is a great deal of indescribable interest to see, but 
there are many trials also, and I am more and more 
impressed that traveling without intelligence, without 
care and labor and study, without maturity and general 
knowledge, without large views and firm principles, is 
calculated to do harm rather than good. 

"To be sure, we can, if we are wise enough, be gath- 
ering all this in the act of traveling, but if we are not 
industrious and interested to get knowledge and strength 
at home, we shall be less likely to do so abroad. 
A. met a young lady in Rome, who had seen almost 
nothing of its real treasures. She bought jewelry, 
dressed fashionably, and went to parties and balls, of all 
which she will doubtless have much to say when she 
returns to her native country, but she will not, I think, 
be happier or wiser ; she will not be a better Republican, 
nor love her country more. The best things are always 
with us. They only are wise or good or happy who 
open their eyes to the good things they always have, 
and rejoice in them, instead of looking out with longing 
discontent for that which is beyond their reach." 



A circular describing a contemplated educational 
tour to Europe in 1875, contains the following para- 
graph from Miss Mortimer's pen : — 



THE LIFE WORK. 279 



"Our age may justly be called the Age of Travel. 
Traveling is certainly one of the best means of culture 
open to us, yet from it often comes evil rather than 
good. To guard against the evils, among which may 
be reckoned vanity, discontent, ill-health, and contempt 
for labor; to secure the benefits, — wiser and wider 
views of life, grateful appreciation of our own country 
and its institutions, knowledge of the world and its in- 
habitants, of history and art, to cultivate the taste and 
the imagination, the powers of observation and reason- 
ing, and the moral faculties, will be the aim of this 
tour." 



Before Miss Mortimer's European journey, she 
was the originator of a movement which resulted in 
radical changes in the Board of Trustees of the 
Milwaukee College. This was doubtless in part 
owing to the needs of the College, and in part to 
Miss Mortimer's conviction that women should have 
some share in the responsibility and management of 
an institution for the education of their own daugh- 
ters and friends. It is only to be wondered at that 
Miss Beecher, with all her advanced ideas on the 
subject of education for women had not herself in- 
augurated women in the trusteeship, at the incep- 
tion of the enterprise. That she did not, was 
doubtless owing in part to lack of precedent in such 
office, and in part to the lack of business training 
and experience in women at that time for the duties 
of trustees. When in 1870, Miss Mortimer, in her 
capacity as stockholder in the College, offered the 



280 MARY MORTIMER. 

names of three of the most prominent and efficient 
ladies of Milwaukee as candidates for vacancies in 
the Board of Trustees, they were at once elected 
and their number was increased to five in the suc- 
ceeding year. This movement infused new life and 
interest, and gave rise in 1873 to an effort to pay 
off a small indebtedness on the College property. 
More than this, it paved the way for still greater 
changes in the not distant future. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

WILLOW GLEN I LAST DAYS. 

When Miss Mortimer had given to the College 
her toilful and self-denying labors for many years, 
— it was now about a quarter of a century since 
she began her work at Milwaukee, — it became 
evident to her that she must have relief from the 
heavy responsibilities connected with it, which with 
every year seemed to grow more onerous. She 
was not unwilling, indeed she hoped, to continue 
her work in an institution which had grown dear to 
her by the labors, the prayers and tears which had 
cemented, as it were, its very stones, — an institu- 
tion in which she lived again in the person of its 
Alumnae, many of the most gifted of whom owed 
to her more than to all others, the richest in- 
spiration of noble womanly lives. Miss Mortimer 
was now in the later fifties, more affluent than 
ever before in thought and experience, but with a 
felt need of release from her heaviest responsibili- 
ties if she would retain health and freshness and 
ability to do her best work in the serene afternoon 
of life. 

A quaint and attractive estate in the northern 
suburb of Milwaukee, retired and yet accessible, 

[281] 



282 MARY MORTIMER. 

with cottage, trees, shrubbery, and river at its gar- 
den's foot, attracted her attention, woke her Eng- 
lish longing for country life, — if it had ever slept, 
— and she purchased it in the autumn of 1873. 

To M. B. N.: — 

" Milwaukee, Jan. 18, 1874. 

" I have resigned and bought a farm ! — of two acres, 
and propose to retire to it next July. Are you glad ? I 
am, but perhaps I may be sorry. We mortals spend 
our lives in making and repenting of false steps and try- 
ing to do better. Still, as yet, — and it is two months 
or more that I have held this title deed, — I do not re- 
pent, but rejoice moderately. 

"As for the College, nothing is decided yet, and I 
have no idea what will be. In order to get released, I 
seemed driven to this positive step I have taken, instead 
of holding on, hoping to arrange the future before I 
should resign." 

The following account is given in the * ' Annals of 
Milwaukee College : " — 

"But Miss Mortimer's loyalty to that college where 
her later days were spent was unquenched. She ex- 
hibited great interest in the choice of her successor. It 
will be remembered that in 1857 she had known Charles 
S. Farrar, in Elmira, N. Y. 

"That Professor Farrar [then of Vassar College] 
might make the personal acquaintance of the Trustees 
and citizens, the Board, in March, 1874, upon the sug- 
gestion of Miss Mortimer, invited Prof. Farrar to spend 



THE LIFE WORK. 283 

his spring vacation in Milwaukee and deliver a brief 
course of lectures. He accepted the invitation, and in 
April, at the College, he discussed The Application of 
Chemistry to the Art of Living, — a subject assigned 
him by Miss Mortimer. While he was still in Milwau- 
kee, the Trustees offered him the charge of the institu- 
tion beginning with the summer of 1874. The offer 
was accepted on condition that the property be freed 
from all debt and placed in good repair." 

"In the effort to secure the ten thousand dollars 
deemed necessary for the absolute needs of the College, 
Miss Mortimer was most assiduous. Her personal ef- 
fort procured some subscriptions, her contagious en- 
thusiasm made her friends solicitors. When at one time 
the subscription had reached $5000 and it was feared 
further labor was useless, the influence of this lady 
secured $1100 each from Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Plank- 
inton, and the task was as good as finished. 

"The force of teachers was greatly changed. Prof. 
Farrar took the classes in natural philosophy, chemis- 
try, and astronomy. Of the faculty of 1873-4, there 
continued only Miss Helen F. Brace, instructor in 
geography and history, and Miss Mathilde Hsehnel, in 
French and German." 

In view of the departure of Miss Mortimer, the 
Trustees, on June 25, 1874, entered the following 
memorandum : — 

" In view of the resignation by Miss Mary Mortimer 
of the trust which she has so long held in connection 
with the College, the Trustees desire to place on record 



284 MARY MORTIMER. 

their high and grateful sense of the signal ability, the 
devoted fidelity, the lofty and singularly unselfish 
aims which have characterized her administration. 
They feel that Miss Mortimer can point, with a just 
and honorable pride, to large numbers of young women 
who have gone forth from this institution under her 
moulding hand to adorn and bless the community in 
which they live. In this fact Miss Mortimer's labors 
receive their proudest recognition, and in it she will 
find her noblest reward. The Trustees hereby tender 
to Miss Mortimer their best wishes for her future health 
and happiness." 

Miss Mortimer's hope and expectation of continu- 
ing in a lectureship or professorship at the College 
was not realized, to the keen regret of herself and 
her many friends. But " her interest in the College 
and in the city peopled by its pupils, never abated. 
She wrote lectures for such scholars as could listen 
to them, devised and endeavored to promote a 
post-graduate course, and took the initiatory and 
successful steps toward the establishment of the 
Woman's Club, now luxuriously resident at the 
Athenaeum." 1 

Miss Mortimer's enjoyment of her new home was 
very great, notwithstanding she sorely missed the 
occupation of mind and heart for her pupils which 
nearly forty years of experience had made a part of 
her best life. 

To M. B. N. she writes from — 

1 Wight's "Annals." 



THE LIFE WORK. 285 

" Among the Pines and Willows, 

" iooo Humboldt Ave., June n, 1876. 

"Your very welcome letter reached me duly, and 
should have been answered before had I supposed you 
were going wandering so soon. But I was and am very 
busy, besides having been in a trance of delight with 
the country and my country home. I have been sorry 
for myself, and for all other poor mortals who have 
had, or now have, to live in cities, and still more sorry 
for them if they like city life better than the country ; 
that is, I have been sorry when I could spare a minute 
from being glad and thankful for what was spread 
around me. 

"The freshness and fervor of my youth, and of the 
precious Baraboo days are coming back. God be 
praised that though man is vain and hard, nature is 
ever the same, — full of Him and His truth, goodness 
and beauty. Oh, Life ! how grand and beautiful it is, 
how glorious, even this foretaste ! What shall that be- 
yond be ? . . . " 

To Mrs. O. H. W. : — 

" Willow Glen, July 1. 

"... I grow more and more impressed that our 
simple life and my mingling labor of the hands and 
head, gardening with reading and thinking, is the true 
life." 

ToM. B. N. : — 

"The Pines, Humboldt Ave., Nov. 12, 1876. 
"The pines I see from my chamber window are 
very green, the willows are yellow, the sky is half-hid- 



286 MARY MORTIMER. 

den with a soft haze, the leaves, save the evergreen, 
have nearly all fallen, but I can see the farther, and 
this is charming. The river gleams brightly; the 
winter is close at hand, and nature has made ready for 
it, yet is she beautiful and restful, and I am thankful 
for a home so abounding in nature. 

" I am glad the Baraboo days still warm the hearts of 
those who enjoyed them, — it is an assurance that good 
was done there. I too have had a letter from Miss 

, a very delightful one from her inner self, and she 

remembers Baraboo, — says the sense of personal re- 
sponsibility stirred there has been deepening in her 
ever since. Her soul and life are rich, — seldom has a 
word from any one given me such a sense of richness 
and depth. A hero is in her, and in these troublous 
times she may have opportunity for grand outgrowth. 

"I have heard through the papers and otherwise 

of H.'s settlement at Wellesley, and Miss also. 

I send my congratulations, though I fancy that high 
and beautiful place has its draw-backs like most 
others. . . . 

" I have not been to the Milwaukee College this year, 
but intend to go. . . . An observatory is being built. 

" The summer has passed with plenty to do in my gar- 
den and among my books. . . . Mrs. M. applied to me 
in August, while I was busy preparing some lessons on 
the History of Art, to give a Course of Lessons on Eng- 
lish History at her house. She invited a class, mostly 
of my old pupils, kept us all to lunch every time, took 
us in Director's car to Chicago Exposition, feted us, 



THE LIFE WORK. 287 

etc., and so made a very pleasant time till near the 
close of October, when she was to go to Philadelphia 
and on to Florida. She told me she should wish to 
renew the lessons on her return next summer. . . . 

" Partly incited by Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, who has 
been here, we have discussed the formation of a 
Woman's Club, and have organized one, — have now 
twenty-one members, with Mrs. M., President, several 
Vice Presidents, and myself Secretary. 

"... I drew up a basis to start on, making the 
main point to elevate and purify our civilization, which 
all seemed to accept cordially, and things look promis- 
ing. A longing, again and again expressed in a discus- 
sion at our last meeting, for light and help toward more 
simple living, for power to make the world wiser and 
better, gave me much hope. 

11 We propose to have rooms devoted exclusively to 
the Club." 

To M. B. N.: — 
a iooo Humbolt Ave., Milwaukee, April 8, 1877. 

". . . Your papers have interested me much, though 
for myself I cannot yet deliver myself from the old con- 
viction and feeling that Home Missionary work is espe- 
cially the work for us. We have Indians and Blacks, to 
whom we owe a great debt ; we have Mormons and Chi- 
nese; we have the refuse of all nations, and destitute 
western settlements. Our foreign work is crippled by 
our want of Christian civilization at home. I do not 
wish to hinder the foreign work, do not wish to argue 
with those who have taken it up that they should turn 
from it to the home work, but for myself, my convic- 



288 MARY MORTIMER. 

tions hold me here, and I pray that we may not forget, 
any of us, the duty we owe to our own country. 



" 1 long unspeakably for a higher, deeper life, for the 
conscious presence of the Divine One. Life still rises 
to my vision infinitely blessed and glorious, but I am 
not living it as I wish, am not influencing others as I 
long to do. I have kept myself tolerably busy for a re- 
tired schoolma'am, but yet I do not feel satisfied. 
There is so much lack of organization of strength and 
ability in our world, that, I suppose, most of us feel we 
go largely to waste, while the fields are white for the 
harvest. 

" I have been gone from home two months, — to De- 
troit and St. Louis, as you heard. . . . 

"Yes, I expect to remain in my 'sylvan retreat' this 
summer, but am none the less grateful for your kind in- 
vitation that I feel I cannot accept it. Neither my 
time nor my purse will allow me to take so long and 
pleasant a journey. I wish you could look in upon me, 
and sit under my trees, and muse and talk. 

"I have been reading Lord Bacon a little, with 
much interest, and Macaulay and Thackeray, and do 
not get very lonely in our quiet. I hope to divide the 
summer months between gardening, a little housekeep- 
ing, reading, and writing, besides a little outside work." 

The last extract from Miss Mortimer's corre- 
spondence shall fittingly be from a letter to one of 
her earliest and dearest friends. It was written in 
the early summer of 1877. 



THE LIFE WORK. 289 

To Mrs. F. C. B.: — 

". . . Since I came home, I have enjoyed the spring 
more than I can tell. 

" How restful and beautiful nature is ! I have sat 
looking at the river and the scene beyond, and won- 
dered what the river of Paradise and the Tree of Life 
must be, and felt sometimes that I longed to open my 
eyes upon that blessed scene, where there will be no 
more misunderstandings, no more sin, and no sorrow 
to break one's heart." 

The days at this beloved home, which she had 
now named "Willow Glen" were drawing to a 
close. 

On July 2, she wrote : " There is nothing special 
to report from this peaceful glen," and inquired if 
the friend to whom she addressed this message on 
the shore of Cape Cod, would "be there in Sep- 
tember." On the fourth of July, her valued friends, 
the Waldo family, came. at her invitation to spend 
the day at Willow Glen, and she was the life of the 
party. On the sixth she was seized with an in- 
scrutable malady which, after baffling the skill of 
friends and physicians, was on the eighth pro- 
nounced malignant. Thenceforward she was at- 
tended by the loving and beloved sister who alone 
of her mother's daughters was spared to her, and 
by the faithful brother from Michigan who came at 
her call. Other friends ministered, as far as they 
might, of sympathy and help ; but the suffering of 

20 



290 MARY MORTIMER. 

the early days of illness soon lapsed into uncon- 
sciousness, and she passed to higher service on the 
fourteenth of July, 1877. 

The following threnody for another grand soul, 
written by " H. H.," fitly frames our thought of 
her who vanished so suddenly from our mortal 
sight. 



THE LIFE WORK. 291 



I. 

But yesterday it was. Long years ago 

It seems. The world so altered looks to-day 
That, journeying idly with my thoughts astray, 
I gazed where rose one lofty peak of snow 
Above grand tiers on tiers of peaks below. 
One moment brief it shone, then sank away, 
As swift we reached a point where foot-hills lay, 
So near, they seemed like mountains huge to grow 
And touch the sky. That instant, idly still, 

My eye fell on a printed line, and read, 
Incredulous, with sudden anguished thrill 

The name of this great queen among the dead. 
I raised my eyes. The dusty foot-hills near 
Had gone. Again the snowy peak shone clear. 

II. 

O, thou beloved woman ! soul and heart 

And life, thou standest unapproached and grand, 
As still that glorious snowy peak doth stand. 

The dusty barrier our clumsy art 

In terror hath called Death, holds thee apart 
From us. 'Tis but the low foot hills of sand 
Which bars our vision in a mountain land. 

One moment further on, and we shall start 

With speechless joy to find that we have passed 
The dusky mound which shuts us from the light 

Of thy great love, still quick and warm and fast, 

Of thy great strengths, heroically cast, 

Of thy great soul, still glowing, pure and white, 
Of thy great life, still pauseless, full and bright. 



PART III. 



RETROSPECT 



" Few things are so soul-cheering in the weary pil- 
grimage of life as the knowledge, brought home to one's 
heart, of the life and triumphs of genius and goodness." 

— Mary Mortimer. 



[393] 



CHAPTER I. 

MISS MORTIMER AND HER WORK. 

In personal appearance, Miss Mortimer was be- 
low middle height ; inclining to plumpness which 
never became corpulence ; with most beautiful and 
abundant chestnut-brown hair ; gray eyes ; light 
complexion often flushed ; and beautifully formed 
hands. Her most noticeable physical characteristic 
was her remarkable head, large and with extraor- 
dinary intellectual development. No one could see 
her, even in the most casual manner, and fail to be 
struck by it. 

"I remember the day," writes Miss Frances E. 
Willard, ' ' when she came to our quiet farmhouse, 
when I was about fourteen years old. She was a 
small, plump woman with an astonishingly impres- 
sive head, — so high, so ample, so satisfying in its 
curves and arches." 

Though without special taste in matters of dress, 
she was neat and fastidious, always knowing what 
she did not want, and having a keen perception of 
the modest, unobtrusive and appropriate. 

In manner she was sensitive and diffident by nat- 
ure, and her large experience and observation of 
the world did not suffice to endow her with that 

[295] 



296 MARY MORTIMER. 



ready tact in small things by means of which some 
natures place themselves and others in happy social 
adjustment. She had no power to give " small 
change " in conversation ; her absolute simplicity 
and sincerity forbade the exercise of the little con- 
ventionalities, not always false, of society ; and, 
among comparative strangers, her dignified pres- 
ence, unrelieved by urbanity, was often accom- 
panied by constraint in social intercourse. All the 
more she appreciated the grace and benignity of 
others. Speaking of one of her early friends and 
associates, she once said: "I would give her a 
thousand dollars a year, if that could be, to walk 
once a day through my schoolroom." 

With pupils and intimate friends, and certain 
other natures not her intimates, this shadow of 
constraint vanished, as the sunshine of Miss Morti- 
mer's spirit, forgetful of restraints, flooded their 
intercourse as with the light of noonday, not al- 
ways either in syllogisms or formulae, but in quick 
repartee and contagious mirth. 

For all meanness Miss Mortimer had instinctive 
scorn. In financial matters she was frugal, and 
had a sense of proportion as to the real values of 
that for which money was to be exchanged. She 
was also just ; the nicest sense of honor dominated 
her, and her own interest and convenience weighed 
as nothing in the scale as against right and personal 
obligation. 



RETROSPECT. 297 



In a large sense she was also generous. In her 
early years of teaching, when her salary was small 
and her health poor, she invited a friend, also a 
teacher, to visit her from a distance, and in her 
letter of invitation said that as she was to ' ' share 
in the pleasure and profit of the visit it was but 
right that she should have the privilege of sharing 
in the expense " and wished to enclose ten dollars 
toward it. She was never wealthy, but all good 
causes shared in her benefactions according to her 
perception of their importance, and her means. Of 
her benevolence many affecting instances might be 
given, although she was ever careful not to let her 
right hand know what her left was doing. 

Beyond justice, beyond generosity, she was ca- 
pable of the largest self-sacrifice. Some of her later 
years were burdened with the debts of others which 
she expected to spend her life-time in paying, taken 
upon herself gratuitously that thus she might pave 
the way for higher good. 

One of the most marked features of her charac- 
ter was her appreciation of the good in others, and 
of service rendered to herself. This is apparent in 
her correspondence, where the kindness and unself- 
ishness of brothers and sisters, of friends and pupils 
constantly call forth her overflowing gratitude. 
The quiet nooks and interstices of daily life also 
witnessed many a quivering tone, a grateful sen- 
tence, a thrilling kiss, a magnetic handclasp, the of- 



298 MARY MORTIMER. 

ferings of her heart for little services rendered and 
for manifested love. An act of heroism, of broad 
Christian charity, or a sincere expression of noble 
sentiments by others always called forth her warm- 
est admiration, and would sometimes affect her 
to tears. 

With a vision clear and far-sighted, she could 
not be blind to human sin and frailty, yet she was 
an optimist, looking for and discerning good, not 
only in its smallest manifestations, but even 
through the evil and the failure, out of which she 
was ever looking to see the good brought forth. 

Over whatever was faulty in herself she desired 
to spread no cloak. " You know that I am not a 
patient person," she would say to her associates 
sometimes, thus formulating for them what per- 
chance long and intimate intercourse might not 
have made distinctly a fault to their consciousness. 
Whenever she conceived herself to have departed 
from her high standard of honor or justice in her 
relations toward others, she was prompt to acknowl- 
edge it, without the slightest self-justification or 
palliation. This scorn of what was base extended 
to motive as well as act, and forbade alike self-ex- 
tenuation, and false accusation or unwarranted sus- 
picion of others. 

Her ardent emotional nature led her through 
heights of joy and depths of suffering which often 
shook her like a tempest, but she was not demon- 
strative. Those who shared her interest and felt 



RETROSPECT. 299 



the throbs of her great nature in her prayers and 
instructions can never lose the dynamic power thus 
imparted to their own lives through the subtle law 
of sympathy, but few, perhaps none, even of her 
near friends and most loyal pupils, ever knew the 
depths of that heart or measured its capacity. 

Constantly, in talks to her pupils, would the 
light of her gray eyes vail itself and her face flush 
with feeling, as emotion flashed from heart to brain. 
Often in prayer would her low tones quiver until 
the whole atmosphere was charged with electric 
influence. Sometimes, though rarely, her voice 
would choke with unshed tears, followed by silence 
that could be felt until associate or friend took up 
the unspoken petition and finished the prayer. 
Few of her most intimate friends ever saw her 
weep. The beautiful hand shading the eyes or 
magnetizing the unquiet brain as it supported the 
brow, or the deep tones of feeling in her voice were 
the chief evidences of emotion in her most sacred 
moments. God's angels came to her ' ' with silence 
as their benediction." Her earliest years were sur- 
rounded by Methodist influence, but her birth- 
right would have made her a Quaker. " I do not 
know as I am a very good Presbyterian," she would 
say to her pastor, ' ' but I am certainly not a good 
any-thing-else. " 

Her deep, emotional nature eminently fitted her 
for sympathy, both in joy and sorrow, evidences of 
which abound in letters too personal for publica- 



300 MARY MORTIMER. 

tion. All whose emotions were deeply stirred were 
drawn to her. The young found in her a friend 
ever young. No one, it seemed, ever listened to 
tales of joy and sorrow as did she. Love stories 
were a perennial delight to her, if only the love 
were real and noble ; and she was ever the confi- 
dante of her friends and pupils. 

A friend who shared her inmost love for many 
years, summing up in one sentence the most power- 
ful impression received in that long companionship, 
says : * ' In power of expressing affection Miss Mor- 
timer was wonderful and unapproached." 

Her friendships were many and enduring. No 
length of time nor distance, nor estrangement even, 
could blind her to the best qualities of those whom 
she had once loved. This was because she saw so 
truly the good, the beautiful in each, and loved it 
for itself, with devotion that was in its nature im- 
mortal. 

" Keep your heart warm" said Arnold of Rugby 
to one of his pupils who contemplated an intel- 
lectual life-work, ' ' by intercourse with the poor, 
and with little children." 

Miss Mortimer needed to make no effort to win 
the love of children. She was especially fond of 
them, and generally managed to have a class of 
them to teach, for the pure enjoyment it afforded 
her. No letters which she sent from Europe made 
a more vivid impression than her amusing epistles 
to the children, level to their comprehension and 
with instinctive adaptation to child-nature. 



RETROSPECT. 301 



With the poor she mingled without a trace of 
condescension. She reached out, not doivn, to 
them. One example of her interest in childhood 
and in the lowly was almost her latest work, the 
large share she had in founding the Milwaukee In- 
dustrial School for Girls. The tribute of her pastor 
beautifully sets forth and illustrates these traits. 

Another vivid illustration of her interest in hu- 
manity was the friendship she felt for the Italian 
maid who served her in Rome. " Teresina " was a 
character brightly portrayed in her letters, and the 
friendship between them, though only of a few 
months' growth, was real, and based on intuitive 
knowledge of each other's characters. Teresina 
dearly loved her native land, and the freedom she 
hoped for through the newly acquired unity of 
Italy burned in her heart as on an altar. She 
quickly discerned in Miss Mortimer the sympathy 
and the love of liberty that was like her native air, 
and she soon bestowed upon the stranger, with 
whom she could communicate only in broken sen- 
tences and by her vivid gestures, the name of 
Libcrta. She felt, rather than saw, the fasci- 
nation which Rome exercised over the strange 
lady. 

A touching picture is that of the English-Ameri- 
can mistress and the Italian maid standing together, 
looking down upon the hoary city from the Pincian 
gardens, on the eve of parting. 

"At the head of the Spanish stairs," writes Miss 
Mortimer, ' ' Teresina began to say my farewells 



302 MARY MORTIMER. 

for me. ' Good-by, Roma, good-by, my dear, 
good-by, my love ' she cried, stretching out her 
hand. 

' ' ' You like Roma, you come back ? ' she said. 

" 'Yes, I like Roma, but I cannot come back. 
I am an old lady, and shall be finished soon ' (a 
favorite expression of Teresina's for dying). 

' ' ' No ! No ! ' she cried. ' You young, you fresh, 
you come back, LibertaS 

* ' I fear Teresina's mother is not always kind to 
her. It was a sad farewell, as they stood watch- 
ing our departure. I kissed them both, and pressed 
their hands together," she wrote in unconscious 
self-revelation. 

Although Miss Mortimer did not sing, she was 
especially fond of sacred music, and fastidious in her 
preferences. Both words and music of many com- 
mon hymns were attractive to her, while from 
others she instinctively turned away. Of the older 
favorites, " While Thee I Seek, Protecting Power," 
and "Jesus, Lover of my Soul," were often asked 
for ; while one of Dr. Horatius Bonar's, ' ' I Was a 
Wandering Sheep " was ever of the deepest and 
most pathetic interest to her because of her per- 
sonal experience which it depicted. The ' ' Plym- 
outh Collection of Hymns " was her favorite for 
devotional use in the family and the school. Her 
especial favorites were choice rather than numer- 
ous. She often asked for "The Crusader's 
Hymn," and the " Paradise" of Faber. 



RETROSPECT. 303 

Another, by Faber, was, to her, ' ' the most ex- 
quisite hymn in the English language." 

" SURRENDER. 

"Thy home is with the humble, Lord ! 
The simplest are the best ; 
Thy lodging is in childlike hearts ; 
Thou makest there thy rest. 

"Dear Comforter ! Eternal Love ! 
If thou wilt stay with me, 
Of lowly thoughts and simple ways, 
I '11 build a house for thee. 

"Who made this beating heart of mine, 
But thou, my heavenly Guest ? 
Let no one have it, then, but thee, 
And let it be thy rest ! " 

This hymn was often read to her, but seldom 
sung, as no tune could be found for it that satis- 
fied her. 

Heart history played a great part in her life- 
drama. By her intense and affectionate nature she 
instinctively attached herself to a few friends with 
a passion they had no capacity to return in full. 
This wrought in them caution, a dim perception of 
a depth they could not fathom and an unwilling- 
ness to give themselves up wholly to what they 
could not comprehend or return, however much 
they admired her talents and were fascinated by 
the flame of her devotion. That unwillingness 
wrought revulsion in her, and the passionate friend- 



304 MARY MORTIMER. 

ship burned itself to embers and left her desolate. 
Again and again the flame burst forth, after she 
had thought it vanished, but at length the chill and 
the desolation would creep on and clothe the world 
for the time in somber hues. But her heart, 
though tired by the conflict, was not dead, albeit 
time was required ere passionate love for another 
friend could again spring up. 

The very intensity of these soul-struggles fused 
and mellowed her nature, glanced forth from those 
gray eyes, clothed those mobile features, found ut- 
terance in the tones of that sympathetic voice, and 
laid a magnet in that beautiful hand. Joined with 
an intellectual nature that commanded the homage 
of all, this passionate soul held regal sway over the 
best and deepest young natures with which she 
came in contact. The very excitement of her own 
inner struggles left her in a state to magnetize those 
who had in them some of the elements of character 
which were so grand in her. Immature, inexperi- 
enced, aspiring, moved to admiration and love min- 
gled with awe, these choice young spirits gathered 
around her. They knew not what they did. She 
knew that they could never be satisfied with the 
measure of regard which she could give them ; her 
sense of honor and justice held her back from tak- 
ing their all of affection and giving less than all in 
return. Yet she could not do more, for her impe- 
rious nature selected its own by a mysterious law of 
affinity, and would take no other, though she re- 



RETROSPECT. 305 



spected, admired, and loved these pupils. The 
deepest friendships of her life were with mature 
women, who were often widely and almost hope- 
lessly separated from her by the ongoings of life. 
Yet she could not cast away the daily offered de- 
votion of her pupils, though at times she held her- 
self and them well in hand, fearing to give others 
the pain she herself had suffered. At- other times 
they were encouraged, drawn to her, fascinated as 
with a view of heaven, which ere long, to their 
distress, faded away, when her reason and prud- 
ence reasserted themselves. 

Everywhere and at all times, Miss Mortimer was 
surrounded by an outer circle of those who admired 
and loved her at a respectful distance, and by this 
inner circle which yet reached not the inmost, but 
fluttered with scorched wings around the flame 
of her intellectual and emotional being; "which 
proves," with Mrs. Browning, "that light is good 
for motJis." 

Over all this intense life-drama, Christ and His 
Truth rose like a vision of overpowering excellence 
and loveliness, and to this her passionate nature 
turned with never-failing loyalty, though only at 
favored times could she detach herself wholly from 
earth, and revel alone in the heavenly glory. 

Miss Mortimer's intellectual grasp was strong, 
yet subtle. She thought independently and in no 
beaten track. Pure Mathematics had for her a 
charm, but Geometry, the branch of which she was 

21 



306 MARY MORTIMER. 

most fond, was rather a relaxation than an occupa- 
tion for her mind. Both in Geometry and in 
Algebra her delight in reasoning led her to philoso- 
phize and to dwell upon the metaphysical basis of 
the science, which she would often do until the 
glow of emotion suffused her teaching and inspired 
her pupils. Her greatest power was in argument 
and historical illustration along the loftiest lines of 
theological thought. Her metaphysics was an in- 
strument, not an end, — the means for finding truth. 
She admired and exercised a scientific habit of 
mind but she was not of a scientific turn. Her de- 
light in nature was very great and in its companion- 
ship she found inspiration, rest, and refreshment. 
A simple flower, the spring tints, the forms and 
hues of autumn leaves, the outlines of trunk and 
naked branch and twig of trees against a wintry 
sky, the magic of light and shade gave her — 

" thoughts which lie too deep for tears." 

One of her favorite modes of resting from the 
weariness of school life was to lie on the grass in 
some secluded nook and gaze up through the leaves 
to the blue sky. With a single companion, — 
friend or pupil, — to whom she could speak her in- 
most thoughts, at such times she would discourse 
of the profoundest problems in morals or philos- 
ophy, or deduce the most practical lessons of life 
with the ease with which a humming-bird dips into 



RETROSPECT. 307 



the heart of a rose or an insect floats in the blue 
ether. 

She was fond of old English ballads, and her 
presents to children were frequently illustrated 
copies of some of these, or choice fairy tales. She 
was accustomed to exercise her fertile imagination 
in constructing dramas, which were full of incident, 
with characters strongly drawn. These dramas al- 
ways left their lesson, not with the cant of the pro- 
fessional moralist, but like the events of real life. 

Edward Everett Hale's story, "In His Name," 
delighted her long before it had found its wider 
fame, and she dramatized it for successful perform- 
ance at the College in Milwaukee. In Baraboo, 
her "Trial of the Fairies" before the Supreme 
Court of Elfland, in which fairies, elves, wood- 
nymphs and water-sprites were the defendants, was 
held in the Court House before a great audience. 
It combined the fascinations of story, poetry, and 
music, with beautiful children waving their wings, 
and older pupils wearing the ermine of judges and 
the robes of prosecutors. Its Sequel, the succeed- 
ing evening, was a pageant in which the Queen of 
the Fairies, surrounded by her maids of honor, re- 
ceived the petitions of her subjects for protection, 
and an account of their beneficent labors, inter- 
spersed with dreamy and beautiful music. 

The frequent relaxations she provided for her 
pupils were never given up to noisy merriment and 



308 MARY MORTIMER. 

unthinking enjoyment. One of the many picnics 
given by the students at Baraboo was in a charm- 
ing grove, where at the close of the banquet, two 
winged fairies appeared in a tableau and an ad- 
dress, and then distributed oak-leaf wreaths and all 
manner of symbolic gifts which they took from the 
overhanging trees, after which a troop of singing 
fairies appeared and disappeared at intervals, en- 
ticing the company along the river path, and finally 
disappearing as if by magic. On other and similar 
occasions sweet surprises grew under the feet of the 
guests like flowers in their path, and sentiment, — 
not sentimentality, — was stimulated and made to 
throw a softening gleam over the scene. 

Miss Mortimer's individuality is apparent in the 
indications already given of her peculiar power of 
clear thought charged with emotion, of strong 
emotion controlled by thought. Her work in edu- 
cation was in advance of the times, yet not so far 
in advance that no fruit could be realized. Though 
true romance was interwoven with every vital fiber 
of her being, she was no visionary. Her wildest 
dreams had in them a practical element, and were 
often realized to some extent. 

Her originality in methods was inseparable from 
her unique personality. Whether these methods 
sprang full-armed from her brain, or were the fruit 
of suggestions caught from others by her docile and 
eager spirit, they were brought into practice in a 



RETROSPECT. 309 



variety of original combinations, and were alike 
clothed with the potency of her thought. 

The Socratic method of questioning was, in her 
use of it, a fine art, and by means of it she would 
entangle her pupils in doubt or in the mazes of ab- 
surdity, only to lead them by the same silken cord 
out of the labyrinths, and into the clear light of 
conviction. Many plans for arousing the interest 
of her pupils and their friends were in Miss Morti- 
mer's thought and practice long before they were 
patented and labeled twentieth-century methods. 
Instruction by correspondence was one of her fav- 
orite topics, and that on a wide scale. Scientific 
excursions, summer schools, and travel were recog- 
nized adjuncts to her instruction, and she published 
attractive plans for the union of study and pleasure 
in these ways. Her relations to the professional 
men of a region, and to the mothers in a com- 
munity where she lived, were responsibilities never 
lost sight of, and privileges wielded with most 
beneficial effect to the community and the school. 

A recent prominent discussion of "The New 
Education " informs us that the new differs from 
the old "not in method merely or mainly, but in 
purpose. It aims to create life, to endow with 
power. Its first object is not to teach its pupils to 
read but to observe and do. Therefore the 
kindergarten. It uses the text book as little as 
possible ; sets its pupils to study things, not the 



310 MARY MORTIMER. 

conception of things. Therefore the laboratory 
and the out-of-door experimental classes in natural 
science. It seeks to train the will, no less than the 
intellect. Therefore the manual and industrial 
classes and the gymnastic and military drill. It 
seeks to develop the affections and the emotions, 
faith, hope, love, reverence, conscience. Hence it 
demands, not Milton for the sake of grammar, but 
grammar for the sake of Milton ; not Homer for 
the sake of Greek, but Greek for the sake of 
Homer." All of which in education Miss Mortimer 
foresaw, and a part of which she was and practiced 
half a century before this promulgation. 

An eminent authority has said of Thomas Arnold, 
."His proper field was education, and the chief 
element of his educational method was religious." 
His own statement reversed this, when, in early 
manhood he said, ' ' I have fixed upon the ministry, 
and upon that particular branch of it known as 
education, as my proper field and chosen life 
work." 

Miss Mortimer was both seer and prophet, with- 
out visible ordination. Never an imitator, nor 
even a special student of the aims and methods of 
any educator, she yet had closest sympathy with 
such an ideal as that of Arnold. In her cast of 
mind and aims in education she resembled Mark 
Hopkins still more than she did her English com- 
peer. 



RETROSPECT. 3] 1 



' 'Dr. Hopkins's conception of the college life 
was a philosophic conception, and the scheme of 
studies, the gradual development of the human 
faculties under specific training, had regard to a 
comprehensive philosophy. " * < ' Philosophy has been 
the dominant chord in the harmony of collegiate 
voices as heard in this institution [Williams Col- 
lege]." 

This philosophic conception which places man 
the central object of study, and tests "all questions 
of theology, of politics, and of sociology by the ap- 
plication of the divine-human power" of love in its 
relation to man ; which lays under tribute all his- 
tory, all science, all poetry and art, to elucidate the 
ground and scope of moral obligation, and to train 
his threefold nature, this was the vision of educa- 
tion which animated her life and inspired her work. 

Her reading, necessarily extensive, was yet se- 
lect, according to the deepest laws of spiritual and 
mental affinity. The Bible, after she accepted 
revelation, was her "pole-star," although she 
thought ' ' inspiration, the most difficult of ques- 
tions. " By its light she consciously walked, and 
shuddered at the thought of the utter and outer 
darkness in which she had groped without it. 

Butler, as we have seen, was to her almost an 
inspired guide. For many years, Coleridge was 

Address at the dedication of Mark Hopkins Memorial Hall by 
Horace E. Scudder. 



312 MARY MORTIMER. 

with her a daily text book. ' ' That which will 
stand of Coleridge," says Matthew Arnold, "is this, 
the stimulus of his continual instructive effort, 
crowned often with rich success, to get at and lay 
bare the real truth of the matter in hand, whether 
that matter were literary, philosophical, political 
or religious." This was the secret, doubtless, 
of Miss Mortimer's profit in Coleridge, — they 
were souls in search of the same great object. 
His devout spirit was also her delight, and she 
sometimes quoted to her advanced classes, enam- 
ored of study, the sentiment attributed to Coleridge 
that "one hour of devout prayer is better as an 
intellectual discipline than a year's study in the 
schools without it." 

To Carlyle, as her correspondence reveals, she 
was won by his burning hatred of shams, coupled 
with his faith in the real and the true. His grand 
poetic nature also strongly attracted her. ' ' With 
the gift of song, Carlyle would have been the 
greatest epic poet since Homer," says Lowell. 
"The tree, Igdrasil " as drawn by Carlyle from the 
ancient myth, was to her a fascinating picture. 
For Emerson, she cared comparatively little. 
Horace Bushnell, especially in ' ' Nature and the 
Supernatural " was a suggestive friend. 

Kingsley's " Hypatia " was to her a wonderful 
book, not so much for its matchless portrayal of 
life and philosophy in the fifth century, as for its 
statement of the great and ever-abiding problems 



RETROSPECT. 313 



whose solution was sought by that most finely- 
drawn character, the Jew, and by Hypatia, whose 
devotion to Truth and whose experience of its 
blinding power fascinated Miss Mortimer's idealiz- 
ing tendency. She preferred Thackeray to Dickens, 
and Schiller to Goethe ; indeed Schiller and Carlyle 
were to her for thirty years an inspiration. 

She was an intuitive philosopher. Thought was 
to her the proof and pledge of immortal existence. 
The saying of Descartes, Cogito, ergo sunt, was 
often upon her lips. Locke, Kant, Hegel, Cousin, 
Compte, Hopkins, Hamilton, Porter, and many 
more laid their tributes before her, and from each 
she gathered material for her own metaphysics. 
Great names passed for nothing with her, except 
as her electric affinities gathered their thought to 
the working of her own mind, like steel-filings to a 
magnet. False reasoning and impotent conclu- 
sions fled from the test of her consciousness, as evil 
from the point of Ithuriel's spear. Some of the 
German historical writers, especially Schmidt and 
Schlegel, with Sir James Mackintosh, Henry Hal- 
lam, and Guizot as judicial historians were her 
guides, yet she delighted in the vivid advocacy and 
greater picturesqueness of some other writers whose 
conclusions she could not accept. 

Her words, written in memory of a beloved pu- 
pil, Miss Anna Taintor, a few months before her 
death, unconsciously limned her own portrait. 

' ' She was an intense lover of truth and sincerity, 



314 MARY MORTIMER. 

a hater of all pretense and sham. The glitter of 
this world, the tinsel which covers so much deform- 
ity, the blindness which hinders so many from see- 
ing the true beauty and goodness, seldom deceived 
her. True to the core herself, she recognized truth 
in others, and instinctively shrank from hollowness 
and falsehood." 



CHAPTER II. 

TRIBUTES. 

The Alumnae of Milwaukee College gave sub- 
stantial form to their reverence for Miss Mortimer's 
memory in the establishment at the College of a 
11 Mary Mortimer Library," and, at the time of this 
writing, are engaged in the endeavor to endow a 
chair of instruction in her name. 

In an alcove of the Mary Mortimer Library, a 
beautiful mural tablet attests the affection of her 
Baraboo teachers and graduates. 

In the extracts from correspondence which fol- 
low, initials only are given whenever express per- 
mission to use names has been for any reason 
unattainable. 

Extracts from an Address before the Milwaukee Col- 
lege Endowment Association. 

BY MRS. HELEN BRACE EMERSON. 

"What talisman could be more potent than the name 
of the teacher who gave all that she was to the up- 
building of Milwaukee College, — Mary Mortimer, — a 
name which those of us who knew her best will hold 
forever as well-nigh sacred. 

"As the teacher, in this College and elsewhere, of 
my girlhood, as the friend with whom I taught for 

[315] 



31 G MARY MORTIMER. 



nearly a decade of years, it is fitting that I should speak 
briefly on this occasion of what she was as a woman 
and a teacher. 

"I have in mind her short and rather thick-set figure, 
her energetic step, her shapely and expressive hand, 
her remarkable head with its crown of abundant brown 
hair, her republican simplicity of manner and dress. 

"You know as I do, of her great motherly heart, 
which made her pupils her children, of her quaint 
humor, of her intense love of nature and the beautiful, of 
her passion for flowers, for music, for birdsong ; of her 
interest in art, in painting and especially in statuary. 

"I cannot forget her contributions to my own life in 
all these directions. 

" The leafless trees of winter bring to my mind that it 
was Miss Mortimer who called my attention to the 
beauty of the barren branches and twigs against a 
wintry sky and the full-robed earth of summer recalls 
how she reveled in its affluence, while she seemed al- 
ways with me in the galleries of Europe and in its ca- 
thedrals. Amid its historical associations and its grand 
natural scenery I felt her presence, and so in nature and 
in art as well as in the deep things of the soul, she was 
the guide and inspirer of her pupils. 

" I can hardly trust myself to speak of her matchless 
mind, a mind so royally endowed that words cannot 
convey its riches ; for it was only as it was brought to 
bear upon other minds that all its wealth was even 
suggested. 

"How she knew and could teach language! — 
though language was not her chosen field of instruc- 



RETROSPECT. 317 



tion. As a perplexed under-graduate teacher I once 
appealed to her as to how I could simplify the intrica- 
cies of our mother-tongue for a class of young girls. 
The next day she handed me a small blank book, 
partly filled, in which she had in the meantime written 
in addition to her usual work and care, an English 
Grammar ! I found it a sufficient guide and withal an 
inspiring one to both teacher and class. That little 
book is still one of my greatest treasures. 

"How she loved Mathematics, and how she peopled 
pure space for us with forms and formulae ! Who of 
her pupils cannot remember how she spiritualized as well 
as made real the truth and the science of Geometry? 
And some of us can go farther back, to her table 
drawers where long before kindergarten teaching came 
into vogue, she kept squares, cubes, etc., by means of 
which she taught Arithmetic to the children of the 
primary department. I can see their eager faces now, 
as they surrounded her, learning fractions from broken 
sticks of candy, and divided apples and oranges, to 
which she treated them at the close of the lesson. 

"She was a devoted adherent of science, a close ex- 
plorer along the lines of natural truth, and yet knowing 
and loving mathematics, language, science, she did not 
elect either as her department of teaching. This she re- 
served for History and Metaphysics. These took her 
nearer to the mind and heart of man and God, and to 
them she gave the greater part of her teaching life. 

"To have had her instruction as she unfolded the 
stately steppings of God's providence along the lines of 
History, to have been under her guidance in Moral and 



318 MARY MORTIMER. 

Mental Science, Paley and Butler and her own mar- 
velous Truth-Lessons, until she brought one, in her 
earnest and delicate way, to recognize the evidences of 
Christianity, and the personal regard of a loving Sav- 
iour, to have heard her pray in the school prayer-meet/ 
ing, in the Study Hall at the opening of school, and at 
family devotions, was an inestimable privilege that fob 
lows one through life, Mike the benediction that comes 
after prayer.' 

"Incidentally, and as a part of these branches, she 
gathered us, her pupils, twice a week, with note-books 
in hand, and gave us what she called ' Talks upon 
Esthetics. ' We were assigned the topics of Landscape 
Gardening, Architecture, Sculpture, Painting, Music 
and Poetry, to investigate as best we could in our little 
library; and in keeping with her own philosophical 
tastes, Cousin upon ' The Good, the True and the 
Beautiful' was put into our hands. And so, without 
text-books or photographs, she led us into the lofty 
realms of Goodness, Truth, and Beauty, showing how 
all were allied and how there could be no approach to 
a complete education without a knowledge of all. 

"Her religious belief, born of an experience of 
doubt, suggested only to her pupils that it was to her 
the one most settled thing in the universe, and the real- 
ity and stability of her belief in the Divine and Invis- 
ible, gave her her greatest hold upon others. 

"I have endeavored only to indicate Miss Mortimer's 
mental, moral and spiritual superiority, for what she 
was can never be told. Her unique personality, her 
remarkable intellectual ability, her profound spiritual 
insight, entered into the very life of her pupils, and 



RETROSPECT. 319 



passing from them to others, they will be forever in the 
realm of mind and heart an abiding, quickening power." 

FROM MRS. CAROLINE JOHNSON COLEMAN. 

"I find it not a little difficult to frame thoughts and 
feelings concerning Miss Mortimer. 

" She was so thoroughly an unusual woman that it 
was very easy, I think, for others to mistake her, even 
among those who could most keenly appreciate her 
noble traits ; this might be due to a lurking self-con- 
sciousness on their own part (which something in 
Miss Mortimer would be sure to probe and wound, 
though both sides might still perhaps remain ignorant 
of the cause of the mental clashing) ; or it might be the 
result of untoward circumstances or peculiar personal 
relations. 

"I express myself in regard to her with great diffi- 
dence and distrust of my own explanation of phenomena 
apparent to me. 

" Her powers of analysis and generalization (as dis- 
played signally in her philosophical insight into, and in- 
terpretation of history) were so keen that after once 
reviewing and arranging the details of any given practi- 
cal matter, she was, as it seems to me, very impatient 
of any recurrence to them, and so, unwilling to attend 
to the many after-considerations which tease the most 
of us in this mal-a-propos world. This made her less 
successful in dealing with some every-day matters than 
others far inferior to her in their type of character. 
It also made disjointedness in some cases where in 
deep ways, mind could keenly answer to mind. 

"Miss Mortimers highly spiritual imagination, the 



320 MARY MORTIMER. 

lofty ideal and pure purpose of her life, could not but 
exert a strong influence over every thoughtful, earnest 
life with which hers came in contact, however little ap- 
prehended it might be. 

" In her walk and conversation she strengthened and 
ennobled all high conceptions of the dignity and re- 
sponsibility of living ; that she even aroused to some 
sense of this the most irresponsive and apathetic of 
natures, I firmly believe. 

1 ' I cannot think that any girl who was ever within the 
real reach of her influence, however shallow in character, 
could go through after life without coming at some crisis 
upon a germ of help which Miss Mortimer had left there 
in bygone years. 

" In my own relations with Miss Mortimer, as a com- 
paratively young teacher, and one unacquainted with 
her methods, I was always shown the most entire deli- 
cacy and consideration in ways that betrayed her fine- 
ness of feeling and regard for others rather than herself. 
She often gave credit to others which belonged to her- 
self. 

" I always felt keenly her great loneliness of soul, and 
the unrest which a nature so full of longings and aspira- 
tions must suffer. . . . 

"Her faith was strong and intense and unfailing, 
and truly simple withal. ... 

" I admired and honored and loved her also in tender 
appreciation, but I always felt a downright girl's timid- 
ity with her, — and behaved accordingly, I doubt not. 
For this reason we never came into any close compan- 
ionship, and I feel very incompetent in all that I might 
say concerning her, and self-distrustful, even while I 



RETROSPECT. 32] 



clearly have, to a certain extent, my interpretations of 
her character." 

FROM A BARABOO GRADUATE AND MILWAUKEE 
ASSOCIATE TEACHER. 

" In most complete self-forgetfulness, her soul went 
out in response to every utterance of truth by another. 
More than one of her pupils must surely remember the 
increased courage she felt to express any thought that 
came to her, no matter how awkward, stiff and incom- 
plete her form of speech or written words, because 
there was sure to be one who would understand, and 
that one, her teacher. 

" Mere fine writing was nothing and worse than 
nothing to Miss Mortimer. Smooth and musically- 
sounding essays with little thought in them were coldly 
received, but any poorest expression of that which one 
felt deeply, any merest hint of a new perception of 
truth, or the natural play of wit that with a little en- 
couragement would reveal itself; — all these were fos- 
tered and encouraged. 

" It often happened that girls who had almost all their 
lives been at some signal disadvantage in school, — per- 
haps dull in memory and slow thinkers, — found some 
little native gift, it might be of humor or even of wit, 
or it might be only a capacity for honest admira- 
tion or devoted friendship, or some practical turn of 
housewifery and domestic thrift, made much of by this 
generous friend, so that there came to them a growing 
self-respect, and a new happiness in the sense of social 
value ; and little by little, the more dormant faculties 
came into play and the whole being was quickened. And 
22 



322 MARY MORTIMER. 

this, because of the existence in herself of primary im- 
pulses toward them, tender sympathy, and a belief in 
what was possible to them. 

"What one had really felt or thought, her presence 
gave courage to utter. What had been dimly assumed 
as possible, her glowing face made real. All the en- 
thusiasms of youth were cherished. 

"The judgments of maturity confirmed these, and 
looked with a more assured gaze, even far beyond what 
youthful enthusiasms had seen. 

" Miss Mortimer seemed to be able at once to detect 
the difference between that which was received and ex- 
pressed at second-hand and that which had been freshly 
kindled in the soul itself. 

"What a sympathetic listener she was, when from 
the pulpit or the lecturer's platform, man or woman set 
forth, in simple language or impassioned, the message 
that had come to them in silence and alone ! What 
earnest reverence she had for all true searchers after 
truth, whether pagan, Jew or Christian, philosopher or 
preacher. When she saw the work of God's spirit 
moulding a character and breathing into it His own 
life, she gave to that one her lowliest reverence, and the 
more simple and unrecognized by others, the warmer 
her allegiance. 

"A sister-in-law who passed on before her, a woman 
of great plainness and simplicity, of rare patience and 
faithfulness and love, a Quakeress in religion, was the 
object of a very warm attachment by Miss Mortimer. 
* My sister Anna' — she would say, with a glow in her 
face as though the sound of the name refreshed her in 
her busy life, — 'my sister Anna would do' thus and 



RETROSPECT. 323 



thus. She liked to repeat her very words, and to recall 
her sweet spirit. 

" In one of the later years of her life, Miss Mortimer 
while visiting in the interior of Wisconsin, going to 
spend an afternoon in the home of a lady then teach- 
ing with her in Milwaukee, made the acquaintance of 
that teacher's father. He was a man of the old Puritan 
stock wonderfully preserved from the last generation to 
this, transplanted from New England to the West, liv- 
ing his own life of single-hearted devotion to God and 
his church, in the midst of a careless and irreverent 
community, uttering each morning his prayer that was 
like a Hebrew psalm in music to the Most High God, 
quoting daily the teachings of his old Professors, Woods 
and Stuart, then for so many years in their graves ; liv- 
ing the quaint New England life of fifty years before, 
and as he went about the work of his little village-farm 
or rode to visit his patients, keeping ever in mind, as a 
subject for contemplation, some portion of Scripture 
profitable for correction, reproof or instruction, — a 
man the real sublimity of whose character was hidden 
from the world, and himself quite unknown for what he 
really was, except as he was honored as a pious and 
honest man. 

"It was a discovery to Miss Mortimer. That to 
which others had been blind, she at once saw. It was 
no unfitting return for years of loneliness and obscurity 
faithfully lived out in an ever-growing sense of the 
nearness of an Almighty Friend, that in this, one of the 
last years of his life, one of the most gifted women 
whom it had ever been his lot to meet, one whose name 
he had himself long held in reverence, should meet 



324 MARY MORTIMER. 

him, and in the intercourse of a few hours, learn to 
know him as none had done before. 

" It was a meeting she never forgot, though oppor- 
tunities for repeating it never came. 

" Of Miss Mortimer's letters to me, that dated is 

richly suggestive, and I feel the force of what it ex- 
presses much more than when I first read it years 
ago. 

" So long as I was in America I always felt a peculiar 
stiffness and constraint in writing to her, but in later 
years, I could have said anything to her that I thought 
myself, and could have been helped to better thinking 
and far more earnest feeling by the very attempt to 
say it. P. L. C." 

FROM THE MOTHER OF ONE OF HER PUPILS. 

"Nothing superficial could be thought of for a mo- 
ment in connection with Miss Mortimer's course in 
school. My husband thought highly of her as a thor- 
ough teacher, and was especially in sympathy with her 
discipline in the study of History, and her careful selec- 
tion of thoroughly qualified teachers. C.'s letters home 
from Baraboo Seminary and Milwaukee College were 
gratifying. We discovered the influence over her of a 
superior mind in everything, also a tact and skill that 
created a confidence, familiar yet always respectful. 
This influence of Miss Mortimer, with the thorough in- 
struction of a superior teacher in Mathematics and 
Latin, which C. had before received, gave her advan- 
tages and a self-reliance that have made her eminently 
capable of great enjoyment and usefulness. 

<<M. A." 



RETROSPECT. 325 



FROM MRS. O. H. W. 

"I fear I cannot add anything to your work. I 
think you have a just estimate of her character which, 
to me, was most admirable in every way. I cannot tell 
you how much Miss Mortimer was to me, especially 
after my husband's death. She knew us all as a family, 
and as individuals, as few persons did, and her appreci- 
ation and sympathy were a comfort to me when I could 
not endure that of any one else." 

FROM A FOREIGN PUPIL, AND ASSOCIATE TEACHER. 

" Spare me the pain to speak of Miss Mortimer, for 
I am not yet reconciled to her loss. . . . You know 
she was my counselor, my guide, my mother, here in 
this country, and I feel utterly alone without her. 

"M. H." 

FROM MISS FRANCES E. WILLARD. 

"I was never in an institution where the moral at- 
mosphere was so clear and invigorating as that of the 
Milwaukee College. We used to sit in the great study 
hall without a teacher present, and any girl who misbe- 
haved or laughed or whispered would have been looked 
upon as beneath contempt. We were all 'upon honor ; ' 
the teachers trusted us. I remember, on the first day, 
I went to my class in Geology. Not knowing it was 
against the rule, I spoke to a classmate about the lesson 
as we were climbing the stairs toward our teacher, and 
entirely away from supervision ; my schoolmate looked 
at me brightly and kindly, evidently perceiving that I 
intended no harm, and laid her taper finger on her 
sweet, shy lips. I could not forget in a thousand years 



326 MARY MORTIMER. 

the majesty of the occasion as it impressed my mind — 
the sacred sense of truth it gave me, and the determi- 
nation that it deepened in my spirit to be just as trusty 
and conscientious as she was. 

" Miss Mortimer's conversation was more like that of 
Margaret Fuller than any other to which I have yet list- 
ened. She was philosophic, humanitarian, prophetic, 
in every utterance ; incapable of commonplace, smitten 
by the sense of God, of duty and immortality, and de- 
voted to the unfolding of woman's mental capabilities. 
To have heard her talk is an inspiration that remains 
with me to this day. 

" Miss Mortimer was a figure that, thirty years later, 
would have become central in the pantheon of American 
women." 

FROM A MILWAUKEE PUPIL. 

"There is nothing that I would rather do than render 
some tribute to the memory of Miss Mortimer. If I 
live long enough, the best thing I shall ever do will be 
dedicated to her. . . . 

"From peculiar circumstances she became the dear- 
est friend on earth to me, — knew me as no other person 
did or could know, — was my refuge in every difficulty. 
It is a relief to tell you how I miss her, how bitterly I 
feel that I can no longer confide in her. These woods 
remind me daily of excursions with her, long talks on 
life and truth, and discussions that will never be fin- 
ished. 

"She was a woman of broad vision, far in advance 
of her generation. Among all the educators I have 
known, President Angell of Michigan, President Adams 



RETROSPECT. 327 



of Cornell, Prof. Woodward of manual-training fame, 
Miss Freeman, President of Wellesley College, and 
other teachers, Miss Mortimer would stand, in 1891, a 
noble figure, the peer of any one in her grasp of educa- 
tional problems, and in her unwavering belief in the 
value of a triple culture for humanity, moral, mental, 
and physical. 

"What a keen contempt she had for shams of every 
sort ! Polishes and stains never deceived her ; she was 
always ready to cut down and find the grain of the 
wood beneath." 

Resolutions of respect and sympathy were passed 
by the Board of Trustees of Milwaukee College and 
by the Associate Alumnae. The Trustees attended 
the memorial services in a body, as did also the 
Alumnae. These services were held in Immanuel 
Church, Milwaukee, on the next Sabbath but one 
succeeding Miss Mortimer's decease. The felicitous 
address of her pastor on that occasion showed his 
rare appreciation of her unique character. A trib- 
ute from the College Trustees has been given else- 
where, and the following extract fitly voices the 
feeling of the Alumnae. 

FROM AN ADDRESS TO THE ALUMNAE AT THE ANNUAL 
MEETING SUCCEEDING MISS MORTIMER'S DEATH. 

" For the elder members of the Alumnae, those who 
were the recipients of Miss Mortimer's thoughtful and 
unceasing interest, no eulogy of her is needed. They 
hold in grateful remembrance the influence which lifted 



328 MARY MORTIMER. 

school-life above a mere routine, which made of the 
trivial daily duties 'stepping-stones to better things;' 
whatever of good the later lives of her pupils may show, 
they will not fail to place high among the results of the 
teachings of Miss Mortimer. To the younger members 
of our circle, whose personal knowledge is limited, we 
commend the history of our College. Faithful, in the 
most high and thorough sense of the word, persevering 
in the face of all discouragements, sacrificing many 
things for the sake of her beloved work, Miss Morti- 
mer's devotion to the College should be held in loving 
honor. . . . 

"In the Cathedral of Strasburgh, far up in a gallery 
which commands a view of the glorious edifice, is the 
life-like figure of Erwin, the Architect. He sits in 
thoughtful, watchful attitude, his head supported by his 
arm which rests upon the carved rail before him, look- 
ing down that marvelous vista in whose creation he had 
so large a share ; a vista of clustered columns and 
springing roof, radiant with the light of green and gold 
and crimson, rich with the shadow of the cold gray 
stone. Not as the sole creator does he overlook this 
grand and noble work. Others had prepared the way, 
gifted architects and patient artisans wrought long after 
he finished his labors. The work has stretched down 
the centuries, and is still unfinished. Yet there he 
keeps his faithful, thankful watch, rejoicing in the 
gradual perfecting of his life-work. . . . Even so, I 
love to think, from a loftier, purer height does Miss 
Mortimer look down upon the yet unfinished edifice for 
which she worked and planned. Others labored before 



RETROSPECT. 321) 



her, new hands have taken up the work, but from 
foundation upward we find her thought and skill in- 
wrought, and the pride and interest which filled her 
heart while here, are with her there. 

" Shall we leave the towers unfinished ? 

"Isabel Flanders Dana." 

from a milwaukee graduate (an address read 
before the alumnae, 1892). 

"It is only just to confess that hers was an inspiring 
example, and that in the long years to come no teacher 
of philosophy could have a better spur to effort than an 
appreciation of the work of Mary Mortimer. It is not 
an easy task to explain the method of her teaching. 
Any description of it may seem fulsome and exagger- 
ated, and be set down to a natural tendency to bestow 
mythical qualities upon the figures of our youth. But 
if a varied acquaintance with educators can act as a 
corrective to this disposition, then some value may be 
attached to the opinion that her self-devotedness was 
as rare as her abilities were .exceptional. . . . 

"Those who were fortunate enough to become her 
pupils, to study psychology and ethics under her guid- 
ance, had their own vision sharpened for the inner and 
deeper matters of life. Under her rare exorcism con- 
ventionalities vanished; ' cloth-webs and cob-webs' 
faded away, and classmates looked around uneasily as 
if to escape a flash-light photograph. But the illumina- 
tion was seldom personal. The petty trials of girlhood, 
its trickeries and vapidities were outlined in the picture 
so aptly, that the semblance was somewhat perturbing. 



330 MARY MORTIMER. 

The contrast was given at a later lesson. Leading her 
pupils away from their local life and surroundings she 
would relate to them some touching story of noble de- 
votion or earnest purpose. No moral was enforced, 
but the scene was reproduced with such fervor and dis- 
tinctness of detail that occasionally the class sat spell- 
bound, even after she had returned to every-day life 
and dismissed them. At other times they would arise 
softly and go out, one by one, as if afraid a word 
spoken might dispel the vision. 

" Her fund of anecdote was apparently exhaustless. 
Her illustrations were drawn not only from history, 
which she taught inimitably for many years, but also 
from a wide range of literature. ^Eschylus, Plato, 
Dante, Goethe, Richter, George Sand, Victor Hugo, 
George Eliot, the Brownings, Hawthorne, all in turn 
supplied her with texts which she verified for us. . . . 
The philosophy, poetry, and romance of many ages 
were stored in her memory. . . . The object of her 
teaching, however, was not to produce a transient emo- 
tional effect upon the minds of her pupils, but to help 
them to reason dispassionately and clearly, to forever 
choose the right, regardless of appearances. She 
strengthened the impression of her lessons by portrayal 
of principles in action in a way that was not possible 
by mere iteration of ethical distinctions. . . . There 
was an unworldly philosophy that palliated no schem- 
ing for place or power ; a philosophy old as the hills 
and as everlasting, owned by no sect or race or time, — < 
the simple theory of right thinking and right living. 

» A. B. T," 



RETROSPECT. 331 



From "A Tribute to the Life and Character of Mary 
Mortimer" prepared for tlie " Woman' 's Club of Wis- 
consin," by her friend, 

MRS. WM. P. LYNDE. 

"The Woman's Club of Wisconsin was organized 
mainly through the influence and efforts of Miss Morti- 
mer. She had given the subject much thought, and her 
experience as a teacher, combined with the earnest study 
of woman's nature and needs, enabled her to develop a 
system suited to our condition and circumstances. I 
believe that we now only faintly realize our dependence 
upon her mind, with its power and leisure to think for 
others, and to arrange plans and methods for the future 
of the Club. . . . We all know how eloquent she be- 
came when in her subject she had forgotten herself, and 
how she had power to move her hearers, and to inspire 
them with something of her own earnestness. 

" Her generosity and forgetfulness of self were greater 
than in almost any one I ever knew. They amounted to 
self-abnegation that was almost martyrdom, yet, while 
she was capable of a devotion as rare as it was entire, she 
never affected heroism, or seemed to consider herself 
anything but a common, every-day woman. Nothing to 
me was more wonderful than this estimate of herself. 
Knowing what she had made of herself and accom- 
plished for the world, I cannot recall a single expres- 
sion of self-laudation, or anything that would indicate 
that she considered herself either great or unusual. 

" She had in her heart the largest gift of motherhood, 
greater than falls to the share of most women, and the 



332 MARY MORTIMER. 

rarer that it had not the real mother's compensations. 
It was exercised toward each pupil, throughout her 
life. She ever retained a wonderful knowledge and ap- 
preciation of each individual character, carrying the 
welfare of each in her own heart. . . . She had truth- 
fulness, also, beyond any one I ever knew who had her 
experience of the world, and intimate knowledge of 
varieties of character. The distrust and suspicion of 
individuals so often felt by men and women of the 
world seemed impossible to her. She instinctively saw 
and seized upon the best points of those with whom she 
associated. . . . Her mind was like the ermine ; she 
could not soil the pure white of its nature. . . . And 
yet it was wonderful that she was not oftener deceived 
or betrayed. . . . 

"We mothers, whose children have been her pupils, 
— how are we conscious that she has helped us to form, 
develop, and guide them. For myself, I believe I 
looked upon her as my teacher and counselor, and that 
I have received from her more to inspire hope and to 
strengthen and help toward the higher life, than from 
any other friend. 

"Her religious faith was one of the prominent traits 
of her character. She clung to Christ and Christianity 
with a firmness the more enduring because of the 
doubts which had sometime encompassed her. . . . 
She seemed to live by faith in the Unseen. . . . With 
this experience of her own heart she felt for those who 
differed from her in religious belief, the largest charity. 
Indulgent concerning differences and doubts, she was 
at the same time pained and grieved over friends who 



RETROSPECT. 333 



were losing faith, and labored and prayed for them 
with anxious thought such as few ever knew." 

FROM THE WOMAN'S CLUB, MILWAUKEE. 

"The first special meeting of the club is called to 
give expression to the deep sorrow felt by its members 
in consequence of the irreparable loss it as a Club, and 
they as individuals, have sustained in the death of its 
efficient Secretary and real founder, Miss Mary Mor- 
timer. 

Could her life have been spared to witness the health- 
ful growth of the Club, and to see it becoming all that 
her sound judgment, high aims and pure purposes would 
have aided it to be, her own value would have been but 
more and more clearly manifested, and the hour when 
she could be spared more and more deferred. 

"Self-reliant, and entirely above the reach of the 
petty aims absorbing the best energies of so many 
lives, she was yet always ready to learn from others, 
' as apt to learn as apt to teach.' 

"No one could be more sensitive to, or more appre- 
ciative of, the good in others, and the better, qualities 
of all who knew her were brought out by her influence 
as quickly but as surely as flowers turn toward the 
light. 

"Her childlike faith, her simplicity and sincerity, 
kept her heart pure and fresh. In a time much con- 
cerned with outward seeming, she cared only to be and 
to do. 

"She had that absorbing consecration to one idea 
which characterizes genius. Her whole being, her 



334 MARY MORTIMER. 



powers, purposes and endeavors, were devoted to the 
pursuit of good for others. ... So intent was she 
upon sowing and watering the seed that she could not 
care whose hand should bind the harvest sheaves. 

"Asa teacher her first aim was to inspire each pupil 
with a high ideal of character, and to impress upon her 
a realization of her opportunities and responsibilities as 
the architect and builder of her own life. That the 
foundation should be of Truth, resting upon the im- 
movable rock of the love of God \ that faults should be 
cast aside as unworthy of place in such an edifice ; that 
good qualities should be perfected, like stones polished 
after the similitude of a temple, — the Sacred Temple of 
the Saviour's life — that blessed pattern ever before her 
own eyes, — this was the key-note of her teaching. 

"Her life was a continual aspiration toward the 
beautiful, and those who knew her best count her 
among the world's unwritten poets. 

"Much as she often conveyed to other minds, her 
thoughts were often beyond her ability adequately to 
clothe in language. She could in words give us but 
glimpses of her soul. It is well for us that it was ex- 
pressed in her life. 

"Wholly unconscious of self, her life has been de- 
voted to elevating the lives of all about her from the 
narrow valleys of contracted belief and fog-covered 
ignorance to the plane of wider horizon and a clearer 
atmosphere. 

"This Club, in its organization and aims is an ex- 
pression of the absorbing purpose of her life. She 
would have consecrated herself and us, not only to an 
undeceived search after truth, but to an unceasing war- 



RETROSPECT. 335 



fare against ignorance, disease and crime. She would 
have had us teach poorer mothers how to prevent the 
physical and moral disorders which affect themselves 
chiefly, but which from their contaminating influence, 
taint the very atmosphere we breathe. 

"If we might have disregarded her spoken appeals 
had her life been spared, can we be moved by the 
voiceless eloquence of death, as it urges us to follow 
faithfully and unfalteringly in the paths she tried to 
show us ? 

"Though we may rear no costly monument to her 
memory, yet if, with her faith and enthusiasm we strive 
to make this Club what she desired it to be, — not only 
a means of truest culture for ourselves, but also a 
source of comfort, help and light to the poor, the weak, 
and the ignorant, then the hearts that have been 
cheered, the minds that have been enlightened, and 
the lives that have been redeemed, will form a living 
monument of rarest beauty 

"Sacred to the Memory of Mary Mortimer. 

Mrs. Marion Wolcott Yates, 
Mrs. Julia Pierce Ely. 

Committee. 

The Board of Managers of the Milwaukee Indus- 
trial School prefaced their resolutions of sympathy 
by the following tribute to Miss Mortimer : — 

"We deem it due to ourselves and but a just tribute 
to her memory, to give public expression to our appre- 
ciation of her worth and our sorrow over her death. 
She worked earnestly with us in establishing this Insti- 



33G MARY MORTIMER. 

tution with an interest and labors of no ordinary char- 
acter, and through her counsels much that is best in its 
management has been established. Her great experi- 
ence in teaching, her knowledge of the condition and 
wants of the children, and attention to the details of its 
management, have been of incalculable advantage to 
both teacher and pupils, and contributed largely to the 
success of the day-school. 

"She has taken to her own home and kept for days, 
some of the little ones, and so given them, perhaps, 
their first experience of personal friendship and lov- 
ing homes. We remember with grateful sadness that 
one of the latest acts of her life, the very last of her 
deeds of kindness for this school, was to invite to her 
house some of the older girls, where she received with 
genuine hospitality and entertained as honored guests 
these wayside children of the 'lanes and streets of the 
city ' who brought back with them the memory of (using 
their own words) 'the pleasantest day of their lives. ' 
And she had planned for another set a similar enter- 
tainment." 

EXTRACTS FROM THE MEMORIAL SERMON DELIVERED AT 

THE EMANUEL CHURCH, JULY, 22, 1877, 

BY HER PASTOR, THE REV. 

G. P. NICHOLS. 

"I shall not attempt on this occasion to render any 
complete account of the character and career, whether 
personal or professional, of the noble-hearted woman 
whose name was so long intimately connected with one 
of the educational institutions of this city. 

"The true story of her life and life-work must come 



RETROSPECT. 337 



from the lips of those pupils whom she loved so 
intensely and in whose memories she holds so sacred a 
place. Grateful pupils and fond friends there are, who 
in due time will undoubtedly contribute the colors and 
paint the picture. In the meantime they will suffer 
one — especially if he ministered at the altar where she 
loved to kneel — to come forward from a farther removed 
and more distant point of observation and lay upon her 
grave some expression of the universal respect and sym- 
pathy which this mysterious Providence of her removal 
denied to us all, and which in its deeper and more ap- 
preciative form can only be uttered by the members of 
that inner circle who knew her as the inspirer of their 
minds, loved her as the friend of their lives, and who 
revere her memory as that of a dear Spiritual Mother. 

" Mary Mortimer was first of all herself. Affectation, 
pretension, dissimulation found no place in her. She 
conceded the least to fashion, to vogue, to mere con- 
ventionalities of any kind. She could never bring her- 
self to wear upon body or spirit the prison uniform of 
those tyrants which put out the eyes of so many souls 
and condemn them to spend their days grinding in the 
mill of conformities. She was essentially a non-con- 
formist, that is, she was a native, independent thinker 
and actor. She trusted in the truth that was in herself. 
She dared to be faithful to the Divine thought, which 
she was created to represent, and so, instead of merely 
showing us another reflector of society, another image 
of servile complaisances, we were permitted to enjoy a 
real original scintillation of the Divine mind, and to 
have a new point of light added to our sky. 

"Transparent is the great sun and plain, and such 
23 



338 MARY MORTIMER. 

was she ; a grandly simple nature walking among us 
erectly, and doing strongly before men and women 
whatever she inly felt to be truth, beauty, and righteous- 
ness. Add to this a certain idealizing tendency that 
characterized her, and I think we have the secret of 
much of her peculiar influence over young and ardent 
minds. She was never satisfied with the actual attain- 
ments of life. She was apprehending for herself and 
for others the vision of a good surpassing the realities 
of experience. She sought to keep in the secret soul of 
every one around her the desire for an ideal perfection. 

"But in putting forward this aspect of her character 
first, as in truth I was bound to do, for it was my first 
impression of her, I hope I am not leading any stranger 
to think of Mary Mortimer as a cold, proud, self-reli- 
ant, self-occupied person, without affection, holding 
herself apart from the common sympathy and interest 
of her kind. Her emotional nature was as intense as 
her intellectual vision was clear. Her enjoyment of a 
kindred spirit was like her enjoyment of truth. Re- 
ports of her friendships touch one to the quick like 
romances. 

" She had a boundless heart. She loved nature with 
the simplicity of a child. She never wearied of sitting 
outside the door at ' Willow Glen/ gazing at the varied 
aspects of cloud and foliage and winding river. Her 
overflowing emotion projected its own conscious intelli- 
gence upon objects around, and made them also con- 
scious and sympathetic. The clouds took on faces and 
looked at her, the waving grass nodded to her, the river 
grew communicative and lingered to talk with her, and 
all the birds in the boughs sang to her articulately. She 



RETROSPECT. 339 



loved this communion with nature, and she loved equally 
well from her earliest years communion with books. 
She loved thought, loved beauty, loved purity, loved 
the ideal in poetry and painting and architecture. 

"Not abstractions, however, or inanimate things were 
her real world, but hearts and persons. Her love for 
her pupils was something remarkable. She loved 
them as her own. She loved each one from the out- 
set, ready at once to push the beginners, quick to 
encourage the one winning her way, and greatly sympa- 
thetic with her who was dull and slow. Her influence 
over them went far beyond the mere teacher of books. 
She took them with all their possibilities into her heart, 
and there she ever kept them. 

"Graduates passing away from the college were not 
crowded out of her thoughts and care by new faces en- 
tering. If I may convert a divine word to a human 
application, 'Having loved her own, she loved them to 
the end.' She followed them with her sympathies and 
stimulating ideals into all their life relations and life 
duties, and to no other did they on their part turn so 
quickly for an adviser in their perplexities and for a 
partner in their joys, a comforter in their sorrows. 

"Miss Mortimer had a deep pity or rather a deep 
sympathy, and not a barren one, for the poor and af- 
flicted. A just, affectionate recognition of this trait has 
been given us by her co-workers in the Industrial School. 
It was not going about speaking proper words and doing 
perfunctory kindnesses to the poor and needy, that 
reached to the length of her desire. She did not so 
much pity the neglected, she did not feel toward them, 
she felt with them, shared in her own heart their priva- 



340 MARY MORTIMER. 



tions and distresses, and by sharing perceived how to 
lighten their burden. It was altogether a characteristic 
illustration of her peculiar fellow-feeling with the strug- 
gling, to which the ladies of the Industrial Charity made 
allusion in their appreciative resolutions ; her invit- 
ing to her own home sets of the children and taking de- 
light in personally mingling with them and providing 
entertainment for them. 

"It may sound strange to some, but this same pro- 
found sympathy she extended even to the wicked. She 
had an intense moral sensitiveness. I do not suppose 
any one ever brought to her notice any form of evil 
without being made to feel how alien and revolting it 
was to her nature. Her whole being recoiled at the 
mention of crime. And yet what she could not bear to 
hear, she would suffer under as if it were a personal 
weight on her own soul. The worst sinner, the basest 
wretch, would receive from her an anxiety of desire, and 
if willing to accept it, the tendered hand of help. She 
realized something of that grief of love which found ex- 
pression in our Lord's tears over Jerusalem, . . . even 
weeping in regard to those degraded beings ' who glo- 
ried in their shame ' and those who were enemies of the 
Cross of Christ. 

"Another distinctive sympathy must not be wholly 
passed over. I believe it is a characteristic of the 
highest and best women to be holden by peculiar love 
and devotion to those of their own sex. This interest 
assumes different forms according to the convictions 
and hopes, the tastes and aversions of the individual. 
But if the individual be a true and great-hearted woman, 
she is sure to be solicitous for her sisters. . . . 



RETROSPECT. 341 



"She had a soul filled to overflowing with a sense 
of women's possibilities and women's responsibilities. 
Certainly I need not tell ladies of this city what high 
spheres of sanctity and obligation she attributed to the 
wife, the mother and the daughter, or with what ear- 
nestness and persuasive tenderness she entreated them 
to aspire to their true womanly distinctions. 

"She was singularly open to the reception of all new 
light and at the same time immovable in her implicit 
faith on the Lord Jesus Christ as the mighty Son of 
God, and merciful Saviour of men. Thinking of her 
world-wide intellectual and moral sympathies, together 
with her intrinsic loyalty to the faith once delivered to 
the saints, I am reminded of a grand utterance of Nor- 
man Mc Leod : 'I believe religion to be as broad as 
the charity of Almighty God, and as narrow as his 
righteousness, which divides the slightest shades of 
truth and lines of right and wrong.' 

"Such as I knew Miss Mortimer, I have tried to 
describe her. Those who knew her better will feel the 
absence of many dear and admirable traits. Those 
who knew her best will perhaps best understand how 
impossible it is to represent the full truth and tender- 
ness, the modesty, reality, and fearlessness, the devo- 
tion, fidelity, and unselfishness of such a character as 
Mary Mortimer." 



